314 THE GERMAN ARCTIC EXPEDITION. 



on the whole, and proved serviceable. The supports were, 

 however, weak and unsatisfactory, and constantly requir- 

 ing alteration and strengthening to enable it to bear up 

 against the storms. This took place in the beginning of 

 the winter. Our further apparatus consisted of necessary 

 woollen coverings (fur we had not yet taken to), pro- 

 visions for eight days, and of instruments — theodolite, 

 barometer, and thermometer. 



We began our journey on the afternoon of the 14th of 

 September, in fine quiet weather, and under a cloudless 

 sky. The night previous, in a temperature of 23° Fahr., 

 a thin ice-crust had formed from our harbour over the 

 whole of Clavering Straits to the old land-ice, the extent 

 of which was two nautical miles from the south-west cape 

 of the island, and therefore four nautical miles from our 

 harbour, through which we had to force our way with 

 much trouble, with the boats laden with the sledges and 

 bao-g-ao-e on to the old ice. After three hours' work we 

 reached it, and now the sledge journey may be said to 

 have begun. The sledges, which carried about six cwt., 

 were drawn by six men, the Captain, First Lieutenant 

 Payer, Tramnitz, Kranschner, Klentzer, and Ellinger, 

 travelling with comparative ease over the almost snowless 

 ice ; but a short distance past the south-west cape of the 

 island, the road became rough and uneven from the half- 

 melted and again frozen snow-drifts, so that it required 

 all our strength to get along. In order not to tire the 

 men too much on the first day, we halted about eight p.m. 

 on a tongue of land running from the Kronenberg of 

 Sabine Island, and raised our tent. Not being yet prac- 

 tised in such travelling, and in all the management of our 

 hands, so necessary in raising tents and cooking food, we 



