PAYER'S RETURN 71 



him ; with every advancing step, made with increasing 

 difficulty, the land gradually disappeared and the 

 horizon of the frozen sea expanded before him ; no ship 

 was to be seen, no trace of man for thousands of miles 

 except a cairn with the fragments of a flag fluttering in 

 the wind, and a grave half covered with snow. Still 

 he climbed, and suddenly three masts emerged. He 

 had found the ship ; there she lay about three miles off, 

 appearing on the frozen ocean no bigger than a fly, the 

 icebergs and drifts around her having hidden her 

 amongst them. He held the heads of the dogs to- 

 wards her and pointed with his arm to where she lay ; 

 and they saw her, and away they went, to find all but 

 the watch asleep. 



After another sledge journey north-westwards to 

 Mount Brunn, from which Richtofen Peak was sighted, 

 preparations were made for abandoning the ship and 

 returning home. The three boats left the Tegetthqff 

 on the 20th of May, but so slow was the progress over 

 the difficult route that at the end of every day in the 

 first week it was possible for Payer to go back to her 

 on the dog-sledge to replenish the stores which had 

 been consumed ; and at the end of two months of in- 

 describable effort the distance between the boats and 

 the ship was not more than eight statute miles. The 

 heights of Wilczek Land were still distinctly visible 

 and its lines of rocks shone with mocking brilliance in 

 the ever-growing daylight. All things appeared to 

 promise that after a long struggle with the ice there 

 remained for the expedition but a despairing return to 

 the ship and a third winter there with the frozen ocean 

 for their grave. 



