A SURVEYOR'S LIFE, AND SHOOTING. 271 



ready to rip them up. I called the dogs, but none of them heard 

 me. I had no mind to venture out on to the plateau again, so I 

 crossed over the" bed of the stream, and began to call the dogs once 

 more. But it was fruitless ; my voice was drowned by the tumult 

 of battle on the other side. 



' Had I had ammunition enough, I could, of course, have tried 

 to shoot down the herd at long range, but in these latitudes it is 

 downright malevolent, if not criminal, to shoot anything but what 

 one is obliged to shoot, or what one can make use of. Wolves, 

 foxes, and stoats, however, I except from this rule ; bears, on the 

 other hand, are so important as food for one's dogs that they ought 

 to be allowed to go scot free if one has no use for them, or if one 

 cannot take back the skin on board. 



'I had nothing more to do here for the time being, and so 

 might just as well go back to the tent. On the way down a fog 

 came on, and I lost my way, but luckily fell on to our tracks on 

 the way up, and followed them back to the tent, where I arrived 

 at eleven o'clock at night. Tired, wrought up, and cross, 1 crept 

 straight into the bag. 



' The day afterwards we drove up with the rest of the dogs. 

 There were still nine oxen there, and before them lay " Gulen " on 

 guard, while " Moses " and " Silla " were some way off eating at 

 the animal I had shot the day before. 



' The instant we reached the plateau the remaining animals 

 began the same antics as the day before, and if we were to feed 

 the dogs, there was nothing for it but to shoot down the whole 

 herd. But they never gave in, and, to the very last animal, 

 rushed round attacking the dogs until they fell.' 



On May 3 Baumann and Stolz camped at the mouth of the 

 fjord, south of Depot Point, and remained there for a day, as 

 Baumann had an attack of snow-blindness; and at their next 

 camp, at Depot Point, they were kept by stress of weather until 

 May 9. 



On that date they reached the head of the eastern fjord, where 

 they stayed the whole of the following day, as its surroundings 

 were of great geological interest. They discovered there thick 



