noon
Toward morning a violent snowstorm gathered below them and hid the face of Greenland from view until next morning . Silver Cloud , meantime , was sent up to nearly 5,000 feet altitude , so that they might not collide with any mountain peak during the night . `` Upon my word , '' said Professor Gray , as he stood on the balcony the following morning , and looked out over the white and ghastly picture of desolation , `` I thought Labrador the most inappropriately named country upon the earth , but think of calling this picture of all that is inhospitable and forbidding -- Greenland ! '' By noon they were crossing swiftly the ridge that runs the length of Greenland , so far as is known . Silver Cloud swept within three hundred feet of one lofty peak , covered with eternal ice and snow . Then on and on , swift as an eagle , over the high plateaux and steppes of Eastern Greenland . Early the following morning they arose to find the Arctic Ocean beneath , and Greenland disappearing in the misty horizon behind them .