246 CONQUERING THE ARCTIC ICE 



travel along the edge of a wide lane until a crossing was found. 

 A latitude taken at noon gave us the assurance that what we 

 feared was true, namely, that we were drifting north, and that, 

 although we had been following a course considerably to the 

 south of east, we were two miles to the north of yesterday's 

 position. A sounding at noon gave us four hundred metres with 

 no bottom. We drifted rapidly towards the west-north-west. 



The going was worse in the afternoon than in the morning, 

 but it was not so much the water as the high pressure-ridges 

 which stopped our progress. We had to cut through pressure- 

 ridges higher than any it had yet been our hard luck to 

 encounter, and in one case we passed a ridge which when 

 hewn down was at least 9 feet, and it was at least 15 

 feet just beside the passage we had made. The ice we have 

 had for the last week is rather new ice, about two feet thick, 

 and it is all pressed up in high ridges, while the few level floes 

 between them are cracked in all directions. 



It must be the westerly gale of a few days ago which has 

 made all this havoc in the ice, as the pressure-ridges are quite 

 recent ; the water on the floes, where they were bent down by the 

 immense weight on the top of them, has not yet had time to 

 freeze, and we are often compelled to splash through it with our 

 sledges and dogs. We camped about 4.30 P.M., with only four 

 miles E.S.E. to our credit that is over the ice ; in reality we 

 are probably farther back than we were yesterday, as the ice 

 is drifting fast. 



" Kamalook " is getting worse and shows exactly the same 

 symptoms as " Baby " and " Unimack," only not quite so 

 violently. Like the others, he evinces a great desire for 

 fighting, and we have tied him up very securely for the night. 

 Whether the dogs die from the disease itself, or whether the 

 immediate cause is what they swallow while ill, is doubtful, 

 but " Baby " had, according to Dr. Howe, enough wood 

 splinters in his stomach to cause his death, and " Unimack " 

 ate everything within sight and reach, viz., camera, dog 

 harness, wood, pieces of tin, and the collection of odds and 

 ends we found in his stomach after he was dead would have 

 been enough to kill an ostrich. " Kamalook " is tied so as 

 to be out of reach of everything. We will try whether that 

 plan is of any use. 



