CHAPTER XIII. 



SUMMER JOURNEYS. 



I HAD many plans for sending out sledge-expeditions during the 

 summer. One of them, a trip south on the ' inland ice,' I gave up, 

 as there was so much to be done on board ; but a journey to the 

 west coast of Ellesmere Land, across the glaciated part of it, I 

 hoped to have realized very shortly. I had originally thought of 

 going myself, but gave it up in favour of Isachsen, who had now 

 completed his surveying work. Braskerud was his companion. 



I did not like to send them off just before Whitsuntide, so 

 everything was made ready for a start on the Tuesday following it. 

 On the previous Friday and Saturday provisions for a thirty days' 

 trip were conveyed across the first part of the glacier and deposited 

 on it in a heap. As the glacier was so steep that a full load could 

 not be driven up it, the things had to be taken up in relays. 



On Tuesday, May 23, Isachsen and Braskerud set off. Baumann, 

 Hassel, and Stolz, with their teams, accompanied them across the 

 mountains as far as Leffert Glacier, and returned the next evening. 

 After the returning party had again passed the watershed, and were 

 coming down-hill towards the Tram/ the dogs, metaphorically 

 speaking, took the bit between their teeth, and ran away at such a 

 pace that the only thing for it was to let them go, and get the 

 sledges down to the ship as best they could without them. All 

 the dogs eventually turned up on board except Bauinann's; he 

 went to look for them later in the evening, and at last found 

 them up in a moraine where, not being able to get rid of their 

 harness, they had become entangled in some stones. 



Early on the morning of May 26, Schei and Peder arrived back 

 from their expedition northward. They had not gone farther 



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