Madhouse at the End of the Earth: The Belgica's Journey into the Dark Antarctic Night

by Julian Sancton

He grew a beard, as men often do when going through dark times,

“It was a tough life in those days, bent in passive obedience; but I was twenty years old, I was carefree, confident about the future. The future I dreamed of then already is the present of today. But what reality has ever equaled the sweet splendor of dreams! I now answer to nobody but myself, and yet I must obey still, obey the obligations and responsibilities of all sorts that weigh down on me…. It was simpler then.”

The sight filled even a man as scientifically inclined as Lecointe with reverential awe. “You feel that there is something else besides the earth,” the captain described. “This sort of religiosity makes you sense a God, not a specific God, but a vastly superior being.”