THROUGH DRIFT AND SCUD. 381 



from the south-east, was with us. But, suddenly, to our amaze- 

 ment, we found ourselves quite out of our course far inland, in 

 the midst of some sand-hills and mounds of grit, and all the 

 time I had thought we were driving on the sea-ice ! 



There was only one course for us, which was to go down 

 again ; but this was easier said than done. Wherever we turned, 

 we came on ridges of grit, across which our German-silver 

 runners absolutely forbade our driving. We drove round and 

 round in the sand in this way for several hours, and grew so 

 disgusted at last, that we decided to camp. We had another good 

 reason for doing this, as Fosheim was very nearly snow-blind, and 

 had to retire into the bag as quickly as possible. 



At about half-past four it cleared a little, and as I wanted to 

 know something about these sand-hills, I announced my intention 

 of going out to look round. Fosheim declared he was better and 

 would come too ; it was impossible to keep him in the bag. We 

 managed .to stamp our way to a sand-hill, whence we saw the" 

 sea-ice on the other side of the sands. The country was by no 

 means so bad that we could not easily make our way down to the 

 ice in the right direction, if only there were less drift and we could 

 see our way a little better. It was so late in the day, however, 

 that we thought it hardly worth while to break camp that night. 

 We took such good note of our surroundings that we thought we 

 could find our way among the hills even if bad weather should set 

 in, and we then went back and crept into our bags for the night. 



Thursday, April 19, dawned with a strong breeze from the 

 south-east, and drift and fog so thick that we could hardly see 

 our hands before us. In spite of this, we started at our usual 

 hour, and, strange to say, found our way among the sand-hills so 

 successfully that we reached the sea-ice ; keeping, thenceforward, 

 well away from land so as to be sure of not finding ourselves 

 in a similar predicament, for it was not even a pleasant way of 

 wasting time. 



We drove the whole of that day without seeing land, and 

 supposed we must be outside a fjord. At mid-day, when it cleared 

 at the zenith and the sun came out, I tried to take a meridian 

 altitude with the theodolite, and got one altitude, though it was not 



