REINDEER-SKIN CLOTHING 79 



had it specially thick, medium, and quite light. It 

 took a long time to get these skin clothes prepared. 

 First the reindeer-skins had to be bought in a raw state, 

 and this was done for me by Mr. Zappfe at Tromso, 

 Karasjok, and Kaatokeino. Let me take the oppor- 

 tunity of thanking this man for the many and great 

 services he has rendered me, not only during my prepar- 

 ations for the third voyage of the Fram, but in the 

 fitting out of the Gjoa expedition as well. With his 

 help I have succeeded in obtaining things that I should 

 otherwise never have been able to get. He shrank 

 from no amount of work, but went on till he had found 

 what I wanted. This time he procured nearly two 

 hundred and fifty good reindeer-skins, dressed by the 

 Lapps, and sent them to Christiania. Here I had great 

 trouble in finding a man who could sew skins, but at 

 last I found one. We then went to work to make 

 clothes after the pattern of the Netchelli Eskimo, and 

 the sewing went on early and late thick anoraks and 

 thin ones, heavy breeches and light, winter stockings 

 and summer stockings. We also had a dozen thin 

 sleeping-bags, which I thought of using inside the big- 

 thick ones if the cold should be too severe. Everything 

 was finished, but not until the last moment. The outer 

 sleeping-bags were made by Mr. Brandt, furrier, of 

 Bergen, and they were so excellent, both in material 

 and making-up, that no one in the world could have 

 done better; it was a model piece of work. To save 



