only a few degrees above the freezing-point. The brilliant and
lively effect of a clear day, when the sun shines forth with a
pure sky, whose azure hue is so intense as to find no parallel
even in the boasted Italian sky."]

On the east coast there were numerous icebergs, yet here we were
in open water. Far to the west of us, however, were icepacks, and
still farther to the westward the ice appeared like ranges of low
hills. In front of us, and directly to the north, lay an open
sea.[4]

[4 Captain Kane, on page 299, quoting from Morton's
Journal on Monday, the 26th of December, says: "As far as
I could see, the open passages were fifteen miles or more wide,
with sometimes mashed ice separating them. But it is all small
ice, and I think it either drives out to the open space to the
north or rots and sinks, as I could see none ahead to the
north."]

My father was an ardent believer in Odin and Thor, and had
frequently told me they were gods who came from far beyond the
"North Wind."

There was a tradition, my father explained, that still farther
northward was a land more beautiful than any that mortal man had
ever known, and that it was inhabited by the "Chosen."[5]

[5 We find the following in "Deutsche Mythologie,"
page 778, from the pen of Jakob Grimm; "Then,the sons of
Bor built in the middle of the universe the city called Asgard,