. Greatest wonders of the world . no night andno morning, we have been constantly marvelling at mostastonishing and beautiful spectacles. We have been bathedin red blood, and for hours and hours we have rowed in theboats and plunged over miles of soft snow dragging seal-skins, and I have been drawing hard in the times betweenthe boat excursions; but the air is exhilarating, and we feelequal to almost any amount of work. Sun and snow-showers alternate—fine hard snow it is, that makes ourfaces burn as if before a fire. It is very cold sketching,and incidents and effects follow each other so rapi
. Greatest wonders of the world . no night andno morning, we have been constantly marvelling at mostastonishing and beautiful spectacles. We have been bathedin red blood, and for hours and hours we have rowed in theboats and plunged over miles of soft snow dragging seal-skins, and I have been drawing hard in the times betweenthe boat excursions; but the air is exhilarating, and we feelequal to almost any amount of work. Sun and snow-showers alternate—fine hard snow it is, that makes ourfaces burn as if before a fire. It is very cold sketching,and incidents and effects follow each other so rapidly thatthere is time to make little more than mental notes. Christmas Eve. Those who have felt the peace of a summer night inNorway or Iceland, where the day sleeps with wide-openeyes, can fancy the quiet beauty of such a night among thewhite floes of the Antarctic. To-day has passed, glistering in silky white, deckedwith sparkling jewels of blue and green, and we thoughtsurely we had seen the last of Natures white harmonies;. IN ANTARCTIC SEAS 53 then evening came, pensive and soothing and grey, and allthe white world changed into soft violet, pale yellow, androse. A dreamy stillness fills the air. To the south the sunhas dipped behind a bank of pale grey cloud, and the skyabove is touched with primrose light. Far to the north thedark, smooth sea is bounded by two low bergs, that stretchacross the horizon. The nearest is cold violet white, andthe sunlight strikes the furthest, making it shine like a wallof gold. The sky above them is of a leaden peacock blue,with rosy cloudlets hanging against it—such colouring as Ihave never before seen or heard described. To the west-ward, across the gulf, we can just distinguish the blue-blackcrags jutting from the snowy lomonds. Little cloudytouched with gold and rose lie nestling in the black corries,and gather round the snowy peaks. To the south, in thecentre of the floe, some bergs lie, cold and grey in theshadow of the bank of clo
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, booksubjectcuriositiesandwonder
