Two months earlier we would have enjoyed perpetual daylight in this latitude; but night already fell for three or four hours, and later it would cast six months of shadow over these circumpolar regions.

早两个月，在这纬度内，可能永远是白天，但现在已经有三至四小时的黑夜了，再迟一些，黑夜就要长到六个月。把它的阴影遮盖这些环极圈地方。

Here was an unalterable circumpolar region; but the polar patterns stereotyped in history and legend—without which it had almost seemed that a polar sky could not exist—had never been seen therein.

这是一个不可改变的环极地区；但是历史和传说中刻板的极地图案——没有它，极地天空几乎似乎不可能存在——从未在其中出现过。