THE DOGS COME ABOARD 105 



Bjaaland and Stubberud, as many as possible of the 

 crew were set to work with axe and saw, and in the 

 course of a few hours the Fram had got a new deck. 

 This consisted of loose pieces of decking, which could 

 easily be raised and removed for flushing and cleaning. 

 This false deck rested on three-inch planks nailed to the 

 ship's deck; between the latter and the loose deck there 

 was therefore a considerable space, the object of which 

 was a double one namely, to let the water, which 

 would unavoidably be shipped on such a voyage, run off 

 rapidly, and to allow air to circulate, and thus keep the 

 space below the animals as cool as possible. The 

 arrangement afterwards proved very successful. 



The bulwark on the fore-part of the Fram's deck 

 consisted of an iron railing covered with wire-netting. 

 In order to provide both shade and shelter from the 

 wind, a lining of boards was now put up along the inside 

 of the railing, and chains were fastened in all possible 

 and impossible places to tie the dogs up to. There 

 could be no question of letting them go loose to begin 

 with, at any rate; possibly, we might hope to be able to 

 set them free later on, when they knew their masters 

 better and were more familiar with their surroundings 

 generally. 



Late in the afternoon of August 9 we were ready to 

 receive our new shipmates, and they were conveyed 

 across from the island in a big lighter, twenty at a time. 

 Wisting and Lindstrom superintended the work of 



