Page:Works of Jules Verne - Parke - Vol 2.djvu/273

 to satisfy the inhabitants, and even civilized Europeans, too."

"True enough. Both at Disko and Upernavik we shall find men who have taken up their abode in this inhospitable climate; but, for my own part, it has always seemed to me that their stay there must be a matter of necessity rather than of choice."

"I can quite think that, yet a man can get used to anything; and the Greenlanders don't appear to me so much to be pitied as the laboring classes in our great cities. They may be badly off, but one thing is certain, they are not unhappy. I say badly off; but that does not quite express my meaning. What I would say is, they lack many comforts to be found in the temperate zones, and yet their constitutions are so adapted to this rude climate, that they find a measure of enjoyment in it which we cannot even imagine."

"I suppose it is so, Mr. Clawbonny, since Heaven cannot be unjust; but I have been here many a time, and yet I never can see these dreary solitudes without a feeling of sadness coming over me. And then what names they have given to these capes, and bays, and headlands! Surely they might have found something more inviting than Cape Farewell and Desolation. They have not a very cheering sound to navigators."

"I have thought the same thing myself," replied the Doctor; "and yet these names have a geographical interest attaching to them which we must not overlook. They record the adventures of those who gave them. If I find Cape Desolation among such names as Davis, Baffin, Hudson, Ross, Parry, Franklin, and Bellot, I find soon afterwards Mercy Bay. Cape Providence is good company for Port Anxiety; Repulse Bay leads me to Cape Eden; and Turnagain Point to Refuge Bay. Here I have before me the whole succession of dangers and disappointments, obstacles, and successes, despairing failures, and accomplished results, linked with illustrious names of my countrymen; and as if on a series of ancient medals, I read in this nomenclature the whole history of these seas."

"You have certainly made out a very good case for it, Mr. Clawbonny. I only hope, in our voyage, we may oftener come to Success Bay than Cape Despair."