276 THE FRIENDLY ARCTIC 



on the ice; he could not travel to Banks Island against the wind 

 and drift, and even if he had reached Banks Island, he must surely 

 have starved to death. Natkusiak, the Eskimo, explained that 

 Stefansson had recently developed many unusual ideas. When he 

 first knew him he was like the other white men, but lately Stef- 

 ansson had been getting so he wanted to do many things that other 

 white men never did. All the Eskimos knew that a man cannot go 

 far out on the sea ice and live, and now Stefansson's death had 

 proved it. He thought that it would be the last time, as it was 

 the first, that any one would try to do anything so foolish. We 

 went to bed mourning the loss of our leader, but feeling that we 

 had always known that he would not succeed. 



"The third morning we started out early, determined to stay 

 out all day and all night in a final effort to find some game, I 

 walked a mile or two from our camp, and then from a hilltop I 

 saw a beacon in the distance that I had not noticed the day before. 

 I examined it with my glasses and thought as it was near the coast 

 that it might be an old one erected by somebody from a passing 

 whaling ship. But I was almost sure it had not been there the 

 day before. Then came the thought, 'Perhaps it's one that Stef- 

 ansson has just erected!' and I hurried towards it. I found myself 

 running as my hopes grew stronger. As I neared the beacon I 

 could see that it was a new one built of sod. Could it be that 

 Stefansson and his party were alive? I reached the place almost 

 breathless and found a tiny note in Stefansson's handwriting. He 

 and at least one of his companions were alive! 



" ' Make camp on the beach a quarter of a mile S. W. from here' 

 was all that was written on the note. But that was enough to tell 

 me that they were alive and traveling in the direction of our 

 boat. I hurried back to my camp, but meantime the Eskimo had 

 gone hunting. I could not go home without him, so I waited all day 

 and half the night. He at last returned, having been successful 

 in killing several caribou and a polar bear. 



"We made all haste to the main camp, discussing on the way 

 the probable condition in which we should find the men. We 

 thought of them as worn and haggard, starving and struggling on 

 toward the camp with one last effort. In fact, I thought of them 

 in every condition of which I had read of heroic explorers in story- 

 books. We reached the hut at four o'clock in the morning and I 

 tiptoed round the sleeping quarters, not daring to wake them for 

 fear they needed rest. Stefansson's two companions, Storker 

 Storkerson and Ole Andreasen, were fast asleep in the bunks and 



