202 NEAREST THE POLE 



the east, I was satisfied as we came along that it was 

 practicable and after a brief reconnoissance, I gave 

 the word to pitch the tent, that we would devote the 

 rest of the day to the ascent. 



I felt this was an opportunity not to be lost; the 

 brilliant weather, the chance to perfect my principal 

 angles, and the practical certainty that the elevation 

 would enable me to see what there was beyond, and, 

 I hoped, show me the desired north end of JesupLand. 



After preparing lunch of corn-meal mush and tea, 

 we started for the ascent. 



From the summit 2,000 feet above the sea level and 

 of a more truly Alpine character than any that I have 

 seen in northern Greenland, or Grant Land, the view 

 was more than interesting. East lay the wide white 

 zone of the ice-foot; west the unbroken surface of 

 Nansen's Strait, and beyond it the northern part of 

 that western land which I saw from the heights of the 

 EUesmere Land ice cap in July, 1898, and named Jesup 

 Land, though Sverdrup has later given it the name of 

 Heiberger Land. South, over and beyond some inter- 

 vening mountains and valleys, lay the southern reaches 

 of Nansen's Strait. North stretched the well-known 

 ragged surface of the polar pack, and northwest it was 

 with a thrill that my glasses revealed the faint white 

 summits of a distant land which my Eskimos claimed 

 to have seen as we came along from the last camp. 



From this point I followed the western shore of 

 Grant Land south until it began to trend eastward, 

 hoping to find Sverdrup' s cairn and record, but with- 

 out success, though we all searched the shore carefully. 



