COAL ACCOUNT.
is a beam in the fore-hold, only two feet and a half
from the floor, which he can no longer climb over.
His efforts to crawl under it have been not unaptly
compared to those of a seal waddling over the ice
about its breathing-hole. Mr. Wardle's fat boy was
not more shapeless, and, like that plethoric individual,
he chiefly divides his time between eating and sleeping.
His cheeks are puffed out in a very ridiculous
manner, and altogether he answers very well the description
of Mirabeau's corpulent acquaintance, who
seemed to have been created for no other purpose
than to show to what extent the human skin is capable
of being stretched without bursting. The executive
officer tells me that he sent him the other day to
the upper deck to dress a couple of reindeer; but,
having proceeded far enough to expose a tempting
morsel, he halted in his work, carved off a slice of the
half-frozen flesh, and was found some time afterwards
fast asleep between the two dead animals, with the
last fragment of his bonne bouche dangling from his
lips.
November 1st.
The new month comes in stormy. The travelers were to have set out to-day, but a fierce gale detains them on board. The moon is now three days past full, and if they are delayed much longer they will scarcely have light enough for the journey.
McCormick and Dodge have set a bear-trap between the icebergs Castor and Pollux. It is a mammoth steel-trap, and is baited with venison and fastened with my best ice-anchor. I pity the poor beast that gets his foot in it.
I have been overhauling our coal account, and have regulated the daily consumption for the winter. We
