I Seldom Remember A Brighter Day; The Thermometer Was At 72 Degrees, And It Really Felt More As If We Were Crossing The Line Than Entering The Frigid Zone.

Animated by that joyous inspiration which induces them to make a fete of everything, the French officers, it appeared,

Wished to organize a kind of carnival to inaugurate their arrival in Arctic waters, and by means of a piece of chalk and a huge black board displayed from the hurricane-deck of the "Reine Hortense," an inquiry was made as to what suggestion I might have to offer in furtherance of this laudable object. With that poverty of invention and love of spirits which characterise my nation, I am obliged to confess that, after deep reflection, I was only able to answer, "Grog." But seeing an extra flag or two was being run up at each masthead of the Frenchman, the lucky idea occurred to me to dress the "Foam" in all her colours. The schooner's toilette accomplished, I went on board the "Reine Hortense," and you cannot imagine anything more fragile, graceful, or coquettish, than her appearance from the deck of the corvette, - as she curtsied and swayed herself on the bosom of the almost imperceptible swell, or flirted up the water with her curving bows. She really looked like a living little lady.

But from all such complacent reveries I was soon awakened by the sound of a deep voice, proceeding apparently from the very bottom of the sea, which hailed the ship in the most authoritative manner, and imperiously demanded her name, where she was going, whom she carried, and whence she came:

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