Page:The open Polar Sea- a narrative of a voyage of discovery towards the North pole, in the schooner "United States" (IA openpolarseanarr1867haye).pdf/190

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sort of flame, is a very Drummond light compared with what it was; the clock, which used to annoy me with its ceaseless ticking, now makes grateful music; the books, which are stuck about in all available places, seem to be lost friends found again; and the little pictures, which hang around wherever there is room, seem to smile upon me with a sort of sympathetic cheerfulness. Rolls of maps, unfinished sketches, scraps of paper, all sorts of books, including stray volumes of the "Penny Cyclopædia" and Soyer's "Principles of Cooking," drawing implements, barometer cases, copies of Admiralty Blue Books, containing reports of the Arctic Search, track charts of all those British worthies, from Ross to Rae, who have gone in search of Sir John Franklin, litter the floor; and, instead of annoying me with their presence, as they used to do, they seem to possess an air of quiet and refreshing comfort. My little pocket-sextant and compass, hanging on their particular peg, my rifle and gun and flask and pouch on theirs, with my traveling kit between them, break the blank space on the bulk-head before me, and seem to speak a language of their own. My good and faithful friend Sonntag sits opposite to me at the table, reading. I write nestling among my furs, with my journal in my lap; and when I contrast this night with the night on the glacier summit, and listen now to the fierce wind which howls over the deck and through the rigging, and think how dark and gloomy every thing is outside and how light and cheerful every thing is here below, I believe that I have as much occasion to write myself down a thankful man, as I am very sure I do, for once at least, a contented one.
 * rious; the lamp, which I thought burned with a sickly