PEARY CROSSES GREENLAND 151 



explorer was obliged to turn upon his trail, leaving further discovery 

 for future years. Sad was the backward march, with the feeling 

 that nothing had been gained beyond what he had accomplished 

 three years before. They threw away everything that would impede 

 their march, even to their very tent, and their nautical almanac, 

 except the three leaves containing the calculations they still required. 



On over the endless snow they went with steadily decreasing 

 dogs until but one sledge and two dogs were left. For five days 

 they lived on a few biscuits and a little tea. Then they killed one of 

 the dogs, dividing its meat between themselves and the one that 

 remained. At length the last morsel of food was eaten and the home 

 camp was still twenty miles away. 



What troubled them now was the terrible fear that the Eskimos 

 they had left might have played false, looted the camp, and left them 

 to starvation. Fortunately they proved faithful, and when the three 

 gaunt, wasted men arrived, with their single emaciated dog, food 

 and rest awaited them ; they were saved. 



For days they lay and rested, scarcely able to move, sickened 

 by the food they ate, bleeding at the nose, their legs swollen to 

 twice the natural size. The dog, like themselves, ate and slept, 

 hiding the food he could not eat, as if going back to the wild habits 

 of his kind. There they remained until the arrival of the relief 

 party which Mrs. Peary had succeeded in sending. Such is the 

 story of the great polar explorer's most critical adventure, the one 

 in which he came nearest to meeting the fate of so many of those 

 who had gone before him to the frozen North. 



