Page:Polar Exploration - Bruce - 1911.djvu/90

86 subject) in the Polar Regions, though he may be night and day in a wet camp, continually soaked. It is possible to take a pleasant short sleep, if one is sufficiently tired, on soft slushy snow on a glacier in an exposed position and to be refreshed and to suffer no ill effects whatever despite a thorough soaking; you may get chilly, but you will not "catch cold," or get pneumonia and the like. Infectious fevers are practically unknown well within the Polar Regions, unless possibly contracted in a dirty shop or a filthily-kept house, and even then it is more than likely that no fever would be contracted during the winter months. Generally speaking we may say germ diseases are unknown well within the Polar Regions. People die of old age, organic troubles, such as various forms of heart disease, and by accident; not from germ diseases. Convalescents from serious illnesses rapidly recover, and get renewed health, such as they have never enjoyed before, and wounds heal effectively and with rapidity. Payer, speaking of Dr. Börgen's terrible wounds, says: "The first operation was upon the cabin table. And here we may briefly notice the singular fact that, although he had been carried more than 100 paces with his skull almost laid bare, at a temperature of -13° F., his scalp healed so perfectly that not a single portion was missing;" and Dr. Börgen himself says, "Nor