148 THE RETURN TO FRAMHEIM 



high ridge. We had now gone our fixed distance, and 

 so halted. 



Behind us, in the brightest, clearest weather, lay the 

 glacier, as we had seen it for the first time on our way 

 to the south: break after break, crevasse after crevasse. 

 But in among all this nastiness there ran a white, un- 

 broken line, the very path we had stood and looked at 

 a few weeks back. And directly below that white stripe 

 we knew, as sure as anything could be, that our depot 

 lay. We stood there expressing our annoyance rather 

 forcibly at the depot having escaped us so easily, and 

 talking of how jolly it would have been to have picked 

 up all our depots from the plain we had strewed them 

 over. Dead tired as I felt that evening, I had not the 

 least desire to go back the fifteen miles that separated 

 us from it. " If anybody would like to make the trip, 

 he shall have many thanks." They all wanted to make 

 it — all as one man. There was no lack of volunteers in 

 that company. I chose Hanssen and Bjaaland. They 

 took nearly everything off the sledge, and went away 

 with it empty. 



It was then five m the morning. At three in the 

 afternoon they came back to the tent, Bjaaland running 

 in front, Hanssen driving the sledge. That was a notable 

 feat, both for men and dogs. Hanssen, Bjaaland, and 

 that team had covered about fifty miles that day, at an 

 average rate of three to three and a half miles an hour. 

 They had found the depot without much search. Their 



