310 TIIP^ VOYAGE OF THE JEANXETTE. 



I had almost begun to believe that I knew how to and 

 could manage a dog team, but I have changed my 

 mind. Hitching up eleven dogs to-day to a heavy 

 sled, Melville and I started out on a cruise. We usually 

 have merely to start the team on an old sledge track 

 or foot way, and then, with the judicious use of a long 

 lashed whip, we can ride on the sledge as if it were 

 drawn by horses until the track ends or we wish to re- 

 turn; but to-day we could neither lead nor drive. The 

 dogs would go a few hundred feet from the ship and 

 then bolt, dragging us back to the gangway. If one 

 of us took hold of the leaders, the middle of the team 

 would double back. Whipping on one side would make 

 them vault to the other, and though we occasionally 

 w^eathered the dogs by getting the sledge caught in a 

 snow bank, or capsizing it, when the curved ends would 

 serve as an anchor, it would be only long enough to 

 give us a breathing spell ; for as we had to get the 

 sled free ourselves, the dogs had it all their own way, 

 and tore us back to the ship. Finally, when almost ex- 

 hausted with our conflict, we had to send a man ahead 

 with the "sick" dog, who is a chum of Jack, our 

 leader, and so contrived to keep his attention occupied 

 while we managed the wheelers and mid-ship dogs. 

 Even then one of the dogs was so averse to going that 

 he would throw himself down, and be literally dragged 

 by the neck and body for a hundred yards or more at 

 a time, refusing to get up though beaten with the whip- 

 stock until I w^as tired. Thus we managed to get a 

 mile away from the ship, and then giving the dogs the 

 charge they rattled us back gayly. 



Aioril Ath, Sunday. — At ten a. m. had general mus- 

 ter and read the Articles of War, after which I inspected 

 the ship. The condition of dampness on the berth deck 



