to do.

The story of the voyage reads like the journal of a quiet family at
home, it is so peaceful and uneventful. It tells no tales of hardships
and privations, no sickness or suffering from the isolation.

It is instead the record of a well-ordered household, in which each man
performed the duties assigned to him, duties which gave each enough
exercise to tire him out and make him long for the quiet hours of
reading or chess-playing, or games, which were to follow in the cabin
when the day's work was done.

During the entire trip Nansen and his men performed the various duties
of their lives, turn and turn about, the difference of occupation giving
the men the change necessary to keep them in health and spirits.

The journal tells of little simple festivities, with processions round
the ship, to celebrate Christmas and birthdays. Of the extra dinners
prepared for these great occasions, dinners which made the men feel a
little tight about the waist and sleepy at the grand entertainment which
always closed a holiday.

The book is full of those little simple nothings which seem hardly worth
telling to the outside world, and which are so full of meaning to those
who have lived them through.

The diary is only here and there varied with an account of a bear-hunt,
or a dog-fight, or a wily bear coming along and stealing a dog or two
for his own private consumption. It is at times hard to realize that
these men of whom the journal treats were heroes ready to sacrifice