d Regnar
was bow oar, or, rather, paddle, while Carlo's place was under the
half-deck forward.

The three seal-skins first procured were already about half tanned, and
were formed into tarpaulins, being split in two lengthwise, sewed
together at the ends, and again sewed to the edges of the combings with
seal-sinews, forming a cover for the guns, and also by means of a
gathering cord of fishing-line looped through their edges, capable of
being drawn up and fastened at about the height of the waist of a man
when kneeling, thus forming an additional protection against a breaking
sea.

The oars, with one exception, were cut down into paddles by Peter, for
the paddle, in ice navigation, is incomparably superior to the oar,
which requires open water for effectual use. One oar, however, was left
of its original length for a support to the McIntosh, which, being about
eight feet square, and furnished with brass eyelets, was easily fitted
as a sail; and owing to its black hue, was especially suitable for a
signal of distress among the ice-islands of the Gulf.

It was nearly six o'clock when these repairs were completed, and the
party sat down to dinner, for, except a lunch of cold roast duck, they
had eaten nothing since morning. The salt water, concentrated by
freezing in the Russian manner, and left to boil down the night before,
had produced about two pounds of good salt; and Peter, taking his knife,
soon made a neat tub, like a miniature butter firkin, in which to
preserve it.

After dinner it was proposed that a short walk over the intervening ice
to the sealing-grounds should be undertaken, and headed by Peter, with
an axe to try any suspicious ice, the adventurers reached the floe in
about fifteen minutes' walk. Climbing the higher shore of the berg, they
advanced noiselessly, and without being observed by the seals, gazed
down upon the scene of yesterday's battle. None of the seals seemed to
have deserted the floe, but the ice was crowded with the young "calves"
and the adult parents. Everywhere the mothers might be seen suckling
their helpless young, while the males lazily basked in the rays of the
setting sun, or occasionally indulged in a battle with some rival, which
was not always a bloodless encounter.

Among the living lay the mangled corpses of yesterday's hunt, and over
each fought and feasted a host of gannets, sea-gulls, and cormorants.
The bodies were hidden from view by the birds, which tore with beak