noon
`` Then the moving speck faded out of sight , and everything around was still and cold and solemn and desolate as before . Yet still we ran and ran . `` I said as desolate as before . But O , it was a thousand times more desolate now than ever , -- as the night is darker for the lightning flash that has died away , or a cloudy noon is colder for a single ray of sunshine that has broken through the vapors . `` Yet on and on we ran and ran , until we could run no more . `` And then we laid us down upon the snow and wept , and bemoaned our hard , hard fate ; but no word was spoken . The disappointment was too great for words ; and , after a short rest in the chilly air upon the frozen sea , we wandered slowly back to our poor hut ; and after many weary hours we reached it , not so much alive as dead , -- for through miles and miles of heavy snow we had run after the sledge , and through these same miles we had trudged back again , with the cruel disappointment rankling in our hearts , and with no hope to buoy us up .