Being extremely anxious to get rid, as early as possible, of the drying of our washed clothes upon the lower deck, I had to-day a silk handkerchief washed and hung up under the stern, in order to try the effect of the sun's rays upon it. In four hours it became thoroughly dry, the thermometer in the shade being from -18° to -6° at the time. This was the first article that had been dried without artificial heat for six months, and it was yet another month before flannel could be dried in the open air. When this is considered, as well as that, during the same period, the airing of the bedding, the drying of the bed-places, and the ventilation of the inhabited parts of the ship, were wholly dependant on the same means, and this with a very limited supply of fuel, it may, perhaps be conceived, in some degree, what unremitting attention was necessary to the preservation of health, under circumstances so unfavourable and even prejudicial.
The morning of April 27th being very fine, and the thermometer at +6°, the ship's company's bedding was hung up to air, between the fore and main rigging, being the first time we had ventured to bring it from the lower deck for nearly eight months. While it was out, the berths and bed-places were fumigated with a composition of gunpowder mixed with vinegar, and known familiarly by the name of _devils_; an operation which had been regularly gone through once a week during the winter.
For the last three or four days of April the snow on the black cloth of our housing had begun to thaw a little during a few hours in the middle of the day, and on the 30th so rapid a change took place in the temperature of the atmosphere, that the thermometer stood at the freezing, or, as it may more properly be termed in this climate, the thawing point, being the first time that such an event had occurred for nearly eight months, or since the 9th of the preceding September. This temperature was to our feelings, so much like that of summer, that I was under the necessity of using my authority to prevent the men from making such an alteration in their clothing as might have been attended with very dangerous consequences. The thermometer had ranged from -32° to +32° in the course of twenty days. There was, at this period, more snow upon the ground than at any other time of the year, the average depth on the lower parts of the land being four or five inches, but much less upon the hills; while in the ravines a very large quantity had been collected. The snow at this time became so soft, from the influence of the sun upon it, as to make walking very laborious and unpleasant.