70 NEW LAND. 



our way home, The men from the ' Fram ' were rather done up, 

 and suffered especially from the rubbing of their stiff homespun 

 clothing. One of them was so bad that he could not even drive 

 his load. Clothes of coarse stiff homespun, such as this (it was 

 Norwegian ' vadmel '), are not advisable on an expedition of this 

 kind. If homespun be used, it must be soft, and the seams 

 covered with linen, as otherwise it is possible that one may be 

 entirely incapacitated on a journey which requires great exertion. 



By evening we were again in Alexandra Fjord, at our old 

 camping-ground, where we pitched the tent for the (night. The 

 mate and four of the others volunteered to sleep in the big bag 

 down by the loads, to guard them from dogs and bears. Un- 

 fortunately, the bag was frozen, and they had much difficulty in 

 getting into it, and they too were wet themselves. They laughed 

 and talked, however, in high good humour after they had got 

 into their ice-cover, and jokes poured forth like smoke from the 

 ventilator after we had shut the hood down for them. The last 

 thing we heard was somebody saying that there was no doubt 

 that they would ' keep ' they were actually lying on ice. 



We thought at that time that our loads were unusually heavy, 

 and admired the dogs for being able to draw them; each load 

 was about 550 Ibs. in weight, and each team consisted of six dogs. 

 Later on, we drove much heavier loads, as much as 813 Ibs. a team, 

 even on long daily journeys and in difficult country. The 

 ordinary load drawn by our ponies at home across the mountains 

 in winter is, I believe, about seven hundredweight. A team of 

 six dogs, therefore, draws as much as one pony, and very much 

 they are to be admired for being able to do it, I think. 



On Thursday, October 27, we reached the ' Fram ' again. It did 

 one's heart good to see the old vessel once more, after lying out 

 for weeks in the cold and polar ice. There she was, as cosy and 

 homelike as possible, with her large new deck-building containing 

 a big saloon, six new cabins (three on each side of the saloon), 

 two large cabins for working in, and a new galley for the cook. 

 Plenty of room is required when so many men come and go on 

 long sledge-journeys, for sleeping-bags, tents, fur clothing, and 

 the like, have all to be thoroughly dried. On this occasion 



