the spirits above the even plane of white monotony. It is this fresh interest in the unknown which makes life tolerable. We all like to ponder over the days of our youth; those of an inquiring turn of mind love to reflect upon the youthful days of the earth; and looking at the polar world, as a whole, it bears a close relation to what it must have been when man first came to it. Shortly after noon the thermometer rose, the barometer fell, and the sky assumed a dirty gray. Out of the north came a brisk wind with a steadily increasing force. We have now learned that this is the condition for a storm. The wind increased to a half gale with snow, and continued to blow fiercely all day. At four o’clock we noticed by the squeaking of the ice that a swell was rolling under us. We did not feel its effects about the ship until seven o’clock. Then the ice cracked about us, and was forced together with a pressure which aroused considerable fear regarding the safety of the _Belgica_. Huge hummocks rose on every side, floes were forced over each other, and against the sides of the vessel. The paint was scraped from her, fragments of wood were gouged out of her, and she was thrown over on a floe where she lay taking the thumps and steady pressure with cracks and groans; but the good old ship fought her battle bravely. At about eight o’clock the pressure ceased and the ice separated, leaving small open leads. The _Belgica_ settled down again into the water and sought her equilibrium, and, though there was considerable scraping and grinding against our berths later, there was no more pressure. Early in the evening there appeared a strip of blue sky in the north and in it appeared the moon, now a small crescent, a mere shadow of the huge ball of red seen a fortnight ago. The sky continued to clear during the night, but the storm increased in force.