1916] TO KING CHRISTIAN ISLAND 245 



legs had reeled off their seventeen miles. A few were 

 sick, and with loose trace were endeavoring to keep their 

 places in the team. All were tired and needed strength- 

 restoring meat. One bear alone since leaving Cape 

 Southwest of Axel Heiberg Land was but a mouthful 

 for forty hard-working dogs. 



April 18th was given over to a careful searching for 

 game among the hills of Ellef Ringnes Island. Not a 

 thing but the tracks of a lemming. Was game failing 

 us at the very time when we needed it most? At ^ve 

 o'clock the haze which so often accompanies a low tem- 

 perature ( — 33° F.) lifted from the ice, revealing on the 

 distant horizon King Christian Island, our objective 

 point. On the 19th, six hours and a quarter's travel 

 brought us to the low shore which stretched back into the 

 interior culminating in peaks some 2,000 feet in height. 



We eagerly scanned the shore and hills for tracks of 

 game, far more important to us than a careful examina- 

 tion of the physical characteristics of the country. 

 With food we could do everything or anything; if it 

 failed, nothing. 



