CHAPTER X 



WESTWARD OVER THE GLACIAL FRINGE OF 

 GRANT LAND (CONTINUED) 



IT BLEW and snowed all day of the i8th, and 

 for several hours of the 19th. Then the snow 

 ceased, but the wind continued with increased force, 

 keeping up a blinding cloud of drift. 



We broke camp, leaving all but two days' rations, 

 and our tent and gear, and went in to the land about 

 six miles distant. The march, short as it was, was as 

 disagreeable as I had experienced for a long time, the 

 bitter wind finding every opening in our clothing and 

 filling it with snow, which then melted, so that when 

 we reached the land, we were all thoroughly wet. 

 Close to the land we got out of the drift, but did not 

 escape the wind. 



I was the first to set foot on the "new land," a level 

 patch of fine dark earth and gravel, and was greeted 

 by numbers of purple Arctic flowers, and a few steps 

 showed patches of grass, and moss, and old tracks and 

 droppings of reindeer and hare. A few minutes later 

 a skua gull flew over, and while the tent was being set 

 up, a brant. 



The tent completed, I filled Egingwah and Ooblooyah 

 with coffee, and started them to reconnoitre the ad- 

 jacent country thoroughly. They were gone about five 

 hours, one going southeast, and the other southwest. 



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