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There was one day when we all had an attack of the poetic fever and wrote verses. They will be found in the ship's log.

To-day is Sunday, and as usual we all attended services, which consist of songs and a short talk from C. C. The rest of the day is like any other.


Becalmed in Bering Sea.

Last night an exhausted sandpiper flew on board and was caught. I was asleep and the boys came and laid it on my breast. He Is now safely wrapped in cotton wadding and laid to rest in the aforementioned cracker-box. The boys declared they would whip me for not letting him go, and yet when they get a chance they shoot at birds from the boat for "sport," with no other purpose in view. I am doing my best to educate them in bird lore, but whenever I get off the long Latin names they give me the "ha-ha." By this time and after many lessons the most of them know a murre by sight, and a fork-tailed petrel, and a kittiwake; but when it comes to distinguishing the different species of anklets at a distance they think I am fooling them, and laugh at me until I show them the bird at close range. I never realized before the vastness of the sea as when a solitary little bird dips his wings and flies skyward.

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