THE COAST IN VIEW. 325 



cious throats ; and, with these swallowings and the 

 breakings, we are now so badly off that we must fall 

 back upon rope to replace the skin lines. To add 

 to our embarrassments, Jensen forgot last night to 

 cover over his sledge, (Knorr's makes the roof of our 

 hut,) and when we went out in the morning, the 

 sledge was torn to pieces, the lashings were all eaten, 

 and the pieces of the sledge were scattered over the 

 snow all around the camp. 



I have nearly eight hundred pounds of dog food, 

 but the daily drain is very great ; and this, taken in 

 connection with the slowness of our progress, looks 

 unpromising. 



May 1st. 



We found it impossible to get on to-day with even 

 one half the cargo, and were therefore forced to make 

 three parcels of it, — one of which I estimate that 

 we have brought nine miles, as traveled, though prob- 

 ably not one third that distance in a straight line. It 

 is impossible to describe the nature of the ice over 

 which we have struggled. It is even worse than 



DO 



any thing we have encountered before. The run of 

 to-day has brought the coast quite conspicuously in 

 view. I am coming upon my old survey of 1854, and 

 am not far from my return track at that time ; but 

 how different the condition of the ice ! Then my 

 principal difficulty was in the outward journey, due 

 north from Van Rensselaer Harbor. Returning fur- 

 ther down the Sound, near where we now are, the ice 

 was found to be but little broken, and I crossed from 

 shore to shore in two days. 



I have now a much finer opportunity for observa- 

 tion than I had then, for there was on the former oc- 

 casion much fog, and I was constantly snow-blind 



