THE FIRST ACCOUNT xiii 



dogs working well, it did not take us long to get over 

 these slopes. 



At the next point we met with some small, very 

 steep glaciers, and here we had to harness twenty dogs 

 to each sledge and take the four sledges in two journeys. 

 Some places were so steep that it was difficult to use 

 our ski. Several times we were compelled by deep 

 crevasses to turn back. 



On the first day we climbed 2,000 feet. The next 

 day we crossed small glaciers, and camped at a height 

 of 4,635 feet. On the third day we were obliged to 

 descend the great Axel Heiberg Glacier, which separates 

 the mountains of the coast from those farther south. 



On the following day the longest part of our climbing 

 began. Many detours had to be made to avoid broad 

 fissures and open crevasses. Most of them were filled 

 up, as in all probability the glacier had long ago ceased 

 to move; but we had to be very careful, nevertheless, 

 as we could never know the depth of snow that covered 

 them. Our camp that night was in very picturesque 

 surroundings, at a height of about 5,000 feet. 



The glacier was here imprisoned between two moun- 

 tains of 15,000 feet, which we named after Fridtjof 

 Nansen and Don Pedro Christophersen. 



At the bottom of the glacier we saw Ole Engelstad's 

 great snow-cone rising in the air to 19,000 feet. The 

 glacier was much broken up in this narrow defile; 

 enormous crevasses seemed as if they would stop our 



