360 VOYAGE TO THE POLAR SEA. April 



Shirley has again to be put on the sledge. Porter is 

 rendered hors de combat, and is suffering a good deal 

 of pain. He is just able to hobble after us. Our force 

 is much weakened by the loss of these two men. A 

 beautiful sunny day with the temperature as high as 

 minus 24°. The men are taking kindly to their goggles, 

 rarely taking them off whilst on the march, and quite 

 willing to put up with a little inconvenience rather 

 than be afflicted with snow-blindness. The snow 

 being deep, we found the travelling on the floes very 

 heavy indeed ; the large boat comes along very slowly, 

 and it is seldom we can advance many paces without 

 resorting to " standing pulls." Arrived at the edge of 

 a broad belt of hummocks, through which a road had 

 to be cut, then on to a small floe, then through more 

 hummocks, which again had to succumb before the 

 strenuous exertions of Parr and his untiring road- 

 makers ; then more small floes and more hummocks, 

 and so it goes on. 



6 Some of the floes are thicker than others, and it is 

 of no infrequent occurrence that we have to lower the 

 sledges a distance of six or seven feet from the top of 

 one to the surface of another, or vice versa. After 

 lunch, George Porter, being unable to walk any far- 

 ther, had to be carried on the sledge. This is sad 

 work ; it makes our progress very slow and tedious. 

 Distance marched nine miles ; made good one and 

 a-quarter. 



' l%th. — Having made a slight alteration in our 

 weights by lessening those on the heavy sledge, we 

 resumed the march at noon. Shirley has slightly im- 

 proved, and is able to walk slowly in our rear. So 



