k, contrary
to the usual custom. The spar deck was entirely covered by a hurricane
deck, thus giving complete protection from cold and the stormy weather
we would be sure to encounter on the voyage.

Our only cargo consisted of provisions, ship's stores, ammunition,
coal, and a large stock of chemical batteries and a dynamo for
furnishing electricity to light the ship. We also shipped largely of
materials to manufacture shells for the terrorite guns.

The list of stores included an ample supply of tea, coffee, canned
milk, butter, pickles, canned meats, flour, beans, peas, pork,
molasses, corn, onions, potatoes, cheese, prunes, pemmican, rice,
canned fowl, fish, pears, peaches, sugar, carrots, etc.

The refrigerator contained a large quantity of fresh beef, mutton,
veal, etc. We brought no luxuries except a few barrels of rum for
special occasion or accidents. Exposure and hard work will make the
plainest food seem a banquet.

Thus fully equipped, the _Polar King_ quietly left the Atlantic Basin
in Brooklyn, N. Y., ostensibly on a voyage to Australia. The
newspapers contained brief notices to the effect that Lexington White,
a gentleman of fortune, had left New York for a voyage to Australia
and the Southern Ocean, via Cape Horn, and would be gone for two
years.

We left on New Year's Day, and had our first experience of a polar
pack in New York Bay, which was thickly covered with crowded ice.
Gaining the open water, we soon left the ice behind, and, after a
month's steady steaming, entered the Straits of Magellan, having
touched at Monte Video for supplies and water.

Leaving the Straits we entered the Pacific Ocean, steering north.
Touching at Valparaiso, we sailed on without a break until we arrived
at Sitka, Alaska, on the 1st of March.

Receiving our final stores at Sitka, the vessel at once put to sea
again, and in a week reached Behring Strait and entered the Arctic
Ocean. I ordered the entire company to put on their Arctic clothing,
consisting of double suits of underclothing, three pairs of socks,
ordinary wool suits, over which were heavy furs, fur helmets,
moccasins and Labrador boots.

All through the Straits we had encountered ice, and after we had
sailed two days in the Arctic Sea, a hurricane from the northwest
smote us, driving us eastward over the 165th parallel, north of
Alaska. We were surrounded with whirlwinds of snow frozen as hard as
hail. We experienced the benefit of having our decks