1858-59 British Private Journeys of "Sport and Discovery" (James Lamont)

p. 80, in a description of the cabin: As for reading, it is next to impossible, for I defy any body to read long sitting on a locker nine inches broad; also, the bunks are too dark, and if we try to read in them we generally go to sleep.

p. 4: In an unpretending little work, descriptive of my former voyages, I had enunciated most strongly the opinion that it would for ever prove impossible to approach the Pole of the earth in ships; but, from reading the accounts of the subsequent voyages of Norwegian walrus-hunters, from an attentive study of the ever-increasing mass of Arctic literature, and from muchconversation and correspondence with those learned theorists who, without ever having left their own firesides, stoutly maintain that there is ‘no difficulty whatever in sailing to the North Pole,’ I was induced to consider whether my own opinion—however practically formed—might not have been too hastily adopted after all.