362 THE VOYAGE OF THE JEANNETTE. 



escaped a ducking and the probable loss of the meat. 

 Reaching the place in the rough ice where we had to 

 turn off, we had a terrible time in store for us. With 

 only the weight of the dead bear on the sled, the 

 combined work of three men and eighteen dogs con- 

 sumed an hour in getting over that quarter mile. The 

 dogs pulled willingly enough, for they were homeward 

 bound (and I notice that a difference of one hundred 

 per cent, depends on that fact), and resented the delay 

 by howling and surging at the harness until I thought 

 the drag-rope would part. One minute the sled ^vould 

 be on one side of an uplifted floe piece and the dogs 

 on the other, with a sharp ridge between. When by 

 sheer strength we had pushed it up and over, it would 

 plunge down the other side and stick in a hole heels up. 

 Then we had to dig it out with our hands, and give it 

 another start ; then it would fall, one runner in a crack, 

 and so on. Repeat these things in all shapes and vari- 

 eties and they will give a faint idea. Suffice it to say, 

 that at the end of the hour when we reached smooth 

 ice again we were streaming with perspiration and al- 

 most exhausted. 



May 2od, Sunday. — Another week has come and 

 gone, and we are still held fast in our icy bed. Some- 

 where about this time last year it was that Captain Bai- 

 ley, in the Rush, was blown through Behring Strait in a 

 southeaster, and saw no ice in any direction within his 

 horizon. We are having the southeaster again this 

 year, but we can see no water in any direction within 

 our horizon. The wind seems to howl viciously through 

 our rigging, although it gets no greater velocity than 

 twenty-one miles an hour at any time during the day, 

 and our lead line shows a rapid drift to N. W. through 

 twenty-seven fathoms of water. 



