The mountain, pushing out as a great promontory from the coast amid the
fast sea-ice, towered up higher as our sledge approached its foot. A
great shadow was cast on the ice, and, when more than a mile away, we
left the warm sunshine.

Awed and amazed, we beheld the lone vastness of it all and were mute.
Rising out of the flat wilderness over which we had travelled was a
mammoth vertical barrier of rock rearing its head to the skies above.
The whole face for five miles was one magnificent series of organ-pipes.
The deep shade was heightened by the icy glare beyond it. Here was
indeed a Cathedral of Nature, where the "still, small voice" spoke amid
an ineffable calm.

Far up the face of the cliff snow petrels fluttered like white
butterflies. It was stirring to think that these majestic heights had
gazed out across the wastes of snow and ice for countless ages,
and never before had the voices of human beings echoed in the great
stillness nor human eyes surveyed the wondrous scene.

From the base of the organ-pipes sloped a mass of debris; broken blocks
of rock of every size tumbling steeply to the splintered hummocks of the
sea-ice.

Standing out from the top of this talus-slope were several white
"beacons," up to which we scrambled when the tent was pitched. This
was a tedious task as the stones were ready to slide down at the
least touch, and often we were carried down several yards by a general
movement. Wearing soft finnesko, we ran the risk of getting a crushed
foot among the large boulders. Amongst the rubble were beds of clay, and
streams of thaw-water trickled down to the surface of a frozen lake.

After rising two hundred feet, we stood beneath the beacons which loomed
above to a height of one hundred and twenty-eight feet. The organ-pipes
were basaltic** in character but, to my great joy, I found the beacons
were of sedimentary rock. After a casual examination, the details were
left till the morrow.

** To be exact the igneous rook was a very thick sill of dolerite,

That night we had a small celebration on raisins, chocolate and
apple-rings, besides the ordinary fare of hoosh, biscuit and cocoa.
Several times we were awakened by the crash of falling stones. Snow
petrels had been seen coming home to their nests in the beacons, which
were weathered out into small caves and crannies. From the camp we could
hear their harsh cries.

The scene in the morning sun was a brilliant one. The great colu