HUNTING FOR WINTER FOOD. 337 



floe joined to the young ice, and I therefore tried to reach this. 

 Just as I was at the edge of the floe the young ice gave way, and 

 one of my legs went deep into the water, but I avoided a further 

 ducking by throwing myself forward, and arrived, head foremost, 

 on the floe. The seal, which was not much more than a yard off, 

 now became so violent in its movements that I was afraid it would 

 break the floe to pieces, or dislodge it from the new ice, for we 

 were just at the edge of the little bay. I therefore hastened to 

 give it a charge of small shot in the head, which killed it on 

 the spot. 



' I had not time to skin and cut up my booty, for my clothes 

 were beginning to grow stiff from the cold, and I myself found it 

 fairly cool, so I made my way with all speed on to stronger ice. 

 I arrived safely on board without any further adventures. The 

 day afterwards Hendriksen and I fetched the seal. 



' On September 20, Hendriksen and I, with a team of dogs, left 

 the " Fram," and reached the meat-store on Ytre Eide in the course 

 of four hours, without anything of note happening to us on the 

 way. There was a storm in the night, and as the meat and 

 consequently the tent were placed in a spot where there was not 

 the slightest shelter, we expected every moment to have the tent 

 carried away over our heads. Luckily, this did not happen. 



' Next day I went out on to the ice in Hvalrosfjord with 

 Hendriksen, and then returned to the tent. Not long afterwards 

 both the boat parties arrived with the rest of the walrus-meat. 

 The last of the walrus-catchers went on board on September 24, 

 and I remained behind alone. I made things comfortable the 

 first day. My house this time was not Bjorneborg, but a two-man 

 tent, which was quite as comfortable if not quite as warm. There 

 were no stones within a fair distance of the tent, so I made the 

 guy-ropes fast to large chunks of frozen meat. 



' First I put the inner tent in place, which made things very 

 much warmer. After that I stretched the sail of the boat over 

 the whole of the tent, and made this fast too with lumps of meat. 

 The sail was so big that it almost reached the ground on both 

 sides ; and at each gable wall projected a good way out beyond 

 the tent, thus providing me with two porches. The back one I 

 VOL. ir. z 



