midnight
Hunting seals and polar bears was something of an out-the-way pleasure for seafaring men . Then there were checkers and cards , besides the daily guess as to their position at noon . Strangely enough , for once in the history of Arctic currents , they found themselves being carried where they wanted to go , in a direct line for Point On-na-tak , and during the entire four days and a half there was hardly a point 's deviation from the course . On the evening of the fourth day , Dave thought he sighted land , and the midnight watch reported definitely that there was land to the port bow ; two points , one more easily discerned than the other . This news brought the whole crew on deck . And for two hours there was wild speculation as to the nature of the country ahead of them ; the possibility of inhabitants and their treatment of strangers . Azazruk , the Eskimo , thought that he had heard from an old man of his tribe that the point was inhabited by a people who spoke a different language from that spoken by the Chukches of East Cape and Whaling , on the Russian side of Behring Strait .