THE ICE-CAP AND BACK 



Soon after they started the wind came down off the 

 ice with a force of 40 miles per hour as measured 

 by our hand anemometer at the camp. Under 

 these conditions Belknap is unable to read angles 

 and after a futile effort to do so they return to 

 camp. We must now hurry back, as the Disko is 

 due at Holstensborg on the twenty-ninth or later, 

 and it is our only certain chance to get back to 

 civilization before winter comes. I therefore start 

 to move camp to the ferry landing where we are 

 to meet the Eskimos. They are camped at the 

 ferry with a note from Erlanson and Kallquist, 

 but there is no food. The note tells us that Gov- 

 ernor Bistrup had come in to Camp Lloyd with 

 the Walrus on the twenty-second so as to take us 

 out to the coast, since the Disko was reported 

 ahead of her schedule. She was to stop on the 

 northern trip and would reach Holstensborg on 

 the twenty-seventh, but would not stop on the 

 way south. Bistrup had left on the twenty-fourth 

 Erlanson going with him, since he is to spend the 

 winter at Godhavn. The failure to send us the 

 provisions requested has left us on short rations, 

 as we were later to find that our provisions cached 

 at Camp 2, on which we were depending, had also 

 been partly eaten up during our absence. On the 

 way to Camp Cooley Nathaniel had shot a caribou 



179 



