344 NEW LAND. 



order to support them and the poles in every conceivable manner. 

 The comfort then is certainly not very great. 



During the night the storm went down, and when we drove 

 off the next morning the weather was fine, if not exactly clear. 

 The ice, on the other hand, was by no means better, and in some 

 places was so bad that, to be honest, I began to doubt if there 

 were any use in trying to go on. It looked so impracticable at 

 times, that one was tempted to think that it could lead to nothing 

 but the destroying of our sledges and of almost everything we had 

 with us. It was, however, my opinion that we had no choice in 

 the matter, and therefore we pushed on as best we could. 



At certain places on our way we came across huge rocks, 

 some of which were as big as a cottage, and round them the 

 snow had drifted to such a height that we could only just see 

 the top. When we came nearer we found that, as a rule, the 

 wind had hollowed out a large empty space between the drift 

 and the top of the rock, so that we were often met by a 

 yawning pitfall twelve to eighteen feet in depth. In driving across 

 the steep slope above a rock of this kind the sledges were often 

 in danger of skidding into the hole, carrying with them both men 

 and dogs. I should mention that we were obliged to drive above 

 the rocks, as below was the open sea. I drove first, and always 

 made as wide a sweep as I could, so as to give my companions 

 who came after as much room as possible for leeway. With 

 the three first sledges, as a rule, all was plain sailing, but the 

 more sledges there are in a train the smaller becomes the sweep, 

 and the nearer one approaches to the edge. If there is the 

 smallest gap between two of the sledges the dogs of the hinder 

 one are sure to make a short cut to catch the other up, and the 

 whole thing will probably skid into the hole. 



It once happened that, just as we were passing a rock of this 

 kind, a gap occurred between my sledge and the one following it. 

 As soon as I became aware of this I pulled up ; but almost before 

 I knew what was taking place the dogs had made their usual 

 frantic rush to catch up, and the sledge, men, and team were pre- 

 cipitated into the hole twelve feet below. A moment afterwards, 

 before anything could be done to prevent it, the next sledge came 



