328 THENORTHPOLE 



that needed it, the quarter-deck being littered with 

 all kinds of miscellaneous articles the whole day. 

 On the same day spring work on the ship was also 

 begun, the winter coverings being taken off the Roose- 

 velt's stack and ventilators, and preparations being 

 made for work on the engines. 



A few days later a beautiful white fox came to 

 the ship and attempted to get on board. One of the 

 Eskimos killed him. The creature behaved in an 

 extraordinary manner, acting, in fact, just like the 

 Eskimo dogs when those creatures run amuck. The 

 Eskimos say that in the Whale Sound region foxes 

 often seem to go mad in the same way and sometimes 

 attempt to break into the igloos. This affliction from 

 which arctic dogs and foxes suffer, while apparently 

 a form of madness, does not seem to have any relation 

 to rabies since it does not appear to be contagious or 

 infectious. 



The spring weather, though unmistakably the real 

 thing, was fickle on the whole. On Sunday, May 16, 

 for example, the sun was hot and the temperature 

 high, and the snow all about us was disappearing 

 almost like magic, pools of water forming about the 

 ship; but the next day we had a stiff southwest gale 

 with considerable wet snow. On the whole, it was a 

 very disagreeable day. 



On the 18th the engineer's force began work on 

 the boilers in earnest. Four days later two Eskimos 

 returned from MacMillan, whom they had left at 

 Cape Morris Jesup on the Greenland coast. They 

 brought notes from him giving some details of his 

 work there. On the 31st MacMillan and Borup 



