THE NORTH POLE 



mountains on the continents and opened the channels 

 between the lands. 



Bartlett told me that during the previous night in 

 the camp a mile farther south where I had found his 

 note, the noise caused by the opening of this great lead 

 had awakened him from sleep. The open water was 

 now about a quarter of a mile in width, and extended 

 east and west as far as we could see when we climbed 

 to the highest pinnacle of ice in the neighborhood of 

 our camp. 



Two or three miles to the east of us, as we could see 

 by the vapor hanging over it, the north and south lead 

 which had paralleled our last two marches intersected 

 the course of the lead beside which we were encamped. 



Though farther south than where we had encoun- 

 tered the "Big Lead" in 1906, north of Cape Hecla, 

 this one had every resemblance to that great river 

 of open water which on the way up we had called 

 "the Hudson," and on our way back — when it seemed 

 that those black waters had cut us off forever from the 

 land — we had renamed "the Styx." The resemblance 

 was so strong that even the Eskimos who had been with 

 me on the expedition three years before spoke about it. 



I was glad to see that there was no lateral movement 

 in the ice; that is, that the two shores of the lead were 

 not moving east or west, or in opposite directions. The 

 lead was simply an opening in the ice under the pres- 

 sure of the wind and the spring tides, which were now 

 swelling to the full moon on the 6th. 



Captain Bartlett, with his usual thoughtfulness, had 

 an igloo already built for me near his own when I 

 arrived. While the other three divisions were building 



