"
No skuas, Antarctic petrels, or sea-leopards were seen during our two
months' stay at Ocean Camp.
In addition to the daily hunt for food, our time was passed in reading
the few books that we had managed to save from the ship. The greatest
treasure in the library was a portion of the "Encyclopaedia
Britannica." This was being continually used to settle the inevitable
arguments that would arise. The sailors were discovered one day
engaged in a very heated discussion on the subject of Money and
Exchange. They finally came to the conclusion that the Encyclopaedia,
since it did not coincide with their views, must be wrong.
"For descriptions of every American town that ever has been, is, or
ever will be, and for full and complete biographies of every American
statesman since the time of George Washington and long before, the
Encyclopaedia would be hard to beat. Owing to our shortage of matches
we have been driven to use it for purposes other than the purely
literary ones though; and one genius having discovered that the paper,
used for its pages had been impregnated with saltpetre, we can now
thoroughly recommend it as a very efficient pipe-lighter."
We also possessed a few books on Antarctic exploration, a copy of
Browning and one of "The Ancient Mariner." On reading the latter, we
sympathized with him and wondered what he had done with the albatross;
it would have made a very welcome addition to our larder.
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