From the Captain’s Log
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11.11.99 Finding progress in this direction hopeless… as close as the ice would allow us… and as the winter snow was fast covering the land, and pancake-ice forming on the sea, there was little time to be lost… fruitless attempts to reach the leads of water evidently separating us more and more: were obliged to edge westward. Dwindling supplies. Young Tom v. ill, may be necessary to [illegible—eds.] 22.11.99 We’ve been stranded on this ice floe for two days …four days at the most. Perhaps a week. All around us are other, more or less identical, ice floes. A soft white fuzz roaring softly between the ears, a most curious feeling. The swarms of white bees. At dawn—four days. I’m certain of it. The white sheet of white sky grades into the white [illegible—eds.] and the white swarms of bees and the [illegible—eds.]