THE FRIENDLY ARCTIC 499 



the land eastward, while Natkusiak, Emiu and I struck northwest 

 and camped at the shore floe which was here some six or eight miles 

 from land. 



Hunting conditions were bad both as to thick weather and un- 

 favorable ice. Natkusiak and Emiu hunted eight or ten hours 

 without seeing seals. Thinking the opportunities might improve, 

 we started next morning following the floe edge northeastward. 

 After five miles we came to level ice of this year's origin and felt 

 sure that the sealing would be better. We camped and Natkusiak 

 and Emiu hunted four hours without success, but after supper 

 Emiu went out again and this time got a seal. 



While he was gone and before I knew he had been successful 

 I had come to the conclusion that the food question was getting 

 serious and that I had better see if I could hobble around and do 

 something. One can usually convince himself of what he wants 

 to believe, and I succeeded in concluding that if I walked carefully 

 on snowshoes I should be prevented from slipping or twisting my 

 ankle and that doubtless going half a mile would not affect me. 

 Then if I saw a seal I told myself that I should have to crawl, 

 anyway, and in so doing could not possibly be hurt. Here is the 

 account of the adventure that followed, copied directly from my 

 diary: 



"I intended to send Charlie to the water to sound, but took a 

 walk first to an old ice cake I saw over a ridge and took to be a 

 quarter of a mile away. Walking carefully on snowshoes over level 

 snow, I did not seem to be hurting my foot at all. The cake turned 

 out to be extraordinarily high and over two miles off. It gave on 

 near view the effect of a many-knolled mountain, and each of four 

 successive hills that I took for the top proved lower than the next 

 beyond. The highest was probably between fifty and sixty feet 

 over the sea. From this knoll I saw the main lead of open water 

 trending NE two or three miles west, with many minor cracks 

 nearer. There was also a series of patches of open water trending 

 easterly a mile or two north of me — I was two miles NE x N from 

 camp. To the west I saw a seal about a mile off, and south of it 

 Natkusiak and Emiu who could not see it for the rough ice. As 

 the ice seemed level I decided to try for this seal— it is a long 

 time now since I have been anything but a burden. On setting out 

 for the seal I had an adventure that has several points of interest. 



''On descending in the direction of the seal I found a three-foot 

 tide crack that, in my crippled condition, I could not safely jump. 

 I turned to follow one of the low ridges near the foot of the hum- 



