FEEDING THE DOGS 119 



or two who had felt some doubt at first of what the 

 solution of the dog question would be, but in any 

 case all such doubts were soon swept away. Even at 

 an early stage of the voyage we had every reason to 

 hope that we should land our animals safe and sound. 

 What we had to see to in the first place was to let 

 them have as much and as good food as circumstances 

 permitted. As already mentioned, we had provided 

 ourselves with dried fish for their consumption. Eskimo 

 dogs do not suffer very greatly from daintiness, but an 

 exclusive diet of dried fish would seem rather mono- 

 tonous in the long-run, even to their appetites, and a 

 certain addition of fatty substances was necessary, 

 otherwise we should have some trouble with them. 

 We had on board several great barrels of tallow or fat, 

 but our store was not so large that we did not have to 

 economize. In order to make the supply of fat last, 

 and at the same time to induce our boarders to take as 

 much dried fish as possible, we invented a mixture which 

 was called by a sailor's term dcenge. This must not 

 be confused with " thrashing,"* which was also served 

 out liberally from time to time, but the dcenge was 

 more in demand. It consisted of a mixture of chopped- 

 up fish, tallow, and maize-meal, all boiled together into 

 a sort of porridge. This dish was served three times 

 a week, and the dogs were simply mad for it. They 

 very soon learned to keep count of the days when this 



* Dcenge also means " thrash." TR. 



