144 THE RETURN TO FRAMHEIM 



drivers stood so jauntily by the side of their sledges, 

 letting themselves be carried over the plain at a 

 phenomenal pace. The surface consisted of sastrugi, 

 alternating with smooth stretches like ice. Heaven 

 help me, how we ski-runners had to struggle to keep 

 up! It was all very well for Bjaaland; he had flown 

 faster on even worse ground. But for Hassel and me 

 it was different. I saw Hassel put out, now an arm, 

 now a leg, and make the most desperate efforts to keep 

 on his feet. Fortunately I could not see myself; if I 

 had been able to, I am sure I should have been in fits 

 of laughter. Early that day Mount Helmer Hanssen 

 appeared. The ground now went in great undulations 

 — a thing we had not noticed in the mist when we were 

 going south. So high were these undulations that they 

 suddenly hid the view from us. The first we saw of 

 Mount Hanssen was from the top of one of these big 

 waves; it then looked like the top of a pressure hum- 

 mock that was just sticking up above the surface. At 

 first we did not understand at all what it was; it was 

 not till the next day that we really grasped it, when 

 the pointed blocks of ice covering the top of the 

 mountain came into view. As I have said, it was 

 only then that we made sure of being on the right 

 course; all the rest of the land that we saw was so 

 entirely strange to us. We recognized absolutely 

 nothing. 



On the 30th we passed 87° S., and were thus rapidly 



