500 THE FRIENDLY ARCTIC 



mock about parallel to the tide crack. The goggles I had were 

 made of caribou hoofs by Natkusiak in Banks Island — on the 

 theory that they are making the hardest trip, I let Castel and 

 Noice take two of the three good goggles we have, and Emiu uses 

 the third because he goes ahead usually and therefore needs them. 

 These 'horn' goggles, as I wear them, do not allow a view right 

 in front of one's feet. I am not sure of what I was thinking, but 

 probably of finding a crossing of the tide crack that would not ex- 

 pose my foot to a wrench, when I found myself falling. 



"As there is a belief that one reviews his past, or 'the sins 

 of the past' as others have it, in falling when the fall is likely to 

 end disastrously, I set down here while fresh my experience. First 

 I expected to fall only to my waist, as often has happened, and to 

 support myself on the edges of the crack by my arms. When I 

 found that the crack was too wide and I kept on falling, I thought 

 that this was just like a typical Antarctic experience. Then it oc- 

 curred to me that it differed from the Antarctic cases in that there 

 you could rely on landing on something to stop your fall, but here 

 I might fall into water. Then I decided, on the principle that is 

 habitual with me now, not to speculate further but to wait and see 

 if I dropped on ice or into water before deciding what to do, seeing 

 I could do nothing effectual to forestall either event. 



"When I struck, it proved to be on glare ice — the blizzard 

 that roofed over the crevasse must have been blowing while there 

 was yet water in it, so that the snow which fell into the crack dis- 

 solved in the water. I seem to have struck on my feet, but of 

 course they slipped, and I fell on my left side — the one of the 

 sprained ankle. The crack was not wide enough for me to fall either 

 backward or forward, for my face was towards one wall, my back 

 to the other, and the crack at the bottom only just wide enough so 

 I could crawl along it, though wider higher up at the place I fell. 



"Before moving I noted the thickness of the ice I lay on, which 

 was about eight inches, but with a fresh tide crack an inch wide 

 through which water could be seen. According to this eight-inch 

 thickness I should have been drowned had I fallen in yesterday. 

 In getting my knife (preparatory to making a hole in this ice to 

 measure its thickness) I found the sheath had been torn loose from 

 my belt in the fall. This made me wonder if I might be much 

 hurt, and how long it would be before any one came along my trail 

 to look for me — I concluded six to ten hours, for the men would first 

 have to come home from hunting and then to wait some time for, 



