Wednesday December 2, 1914. Cloudy with SW wind x +7 Last night about midnight Hal and I took a short tramp to the Island. The night was calm and moonlit, the stars have by almost faded from sight in the softly bright light. A gentle south wind sprang up while we were out and to the south we could see a zone of high cirrus streamers pointing to some kind of disturbance below the horizon x There was no open water in sight but in the Sound. But a few days ago I could see the edge of the ice not more than a mile from the Joy Forever. But considerable drift must have come up with this change of weather. Today was dark and thick with a very marked rise in temperature. It is gives one a bit of homesick feeling to have a warm south breeze on a cheek that only yesterday was snapped by a bitter arctic wind x Now Hal, Torch & Jor are carrying out a cribbage tournament ... for the championship of the Polar North I suppose. At any rate they seem to find considerable excitement in it. But when one has no pampered desires for entertainments and extravagant amusement simpler things mean more. There is analogy in this to the appetite for good and simple food that comes to those fortunate people in the world who have stuff to desire to chow x