THE FRIENDLY ARCTIC 51 



was to be left on the Karluk under the charge of Mackay, while 

 Murray was to have taken much of it and transferred it at Herschel 

 Island to the Sachs. 



My plan was that, with Murray in command of her, the Sachs 

 should act in a measure as a tender, carrying supplies for Dr. 

 Anderson towards Coronation Gulf or doing similar errands for 

 Bartlett and the Karluk, if that became necessary. She was to 

 hold herself ready to help wherever needed. In her spare time, 

 which I hoped would be considerable, the Sachs was to cruise 

 about in the triangle between Herschel Island, Coronation Gulf 

 and Cape Kellett, venturing as far as she cared northwestward into 

 the Beaufort Sea, but always keeping in this comparatively ice- 

 free district. For although she was seaworthy and staunch in every 

 other way, she was incapacitated for too close contact with the 

 ice through having two propellers. An unexpected increase of 

 cargo at Nome had compelled us to buy the Sachs, in spite 

 of the twin-propeller drawback, as the only craft available. This 

 increase of cargo was due to my yielding to certain members of 

 our staff who thought they would need certain provisions and 

 equipment I had planned to dispense with. 



When a ship has a single propeller located amidships, aft, the 

 passage of her body through the ice shoves it away and keeps a 

 clear path for the propeller. But with the twin screw arrangement 

 the propellers stick out at the sides aft in such a way that when 

 the ship forces her way through ice she does not make a road 

 wide enough, and the propellers will strike the cakes that have slid 

 back past her sides. There is a good deal of ice in the spring in the 

 southeastern Beaufort Sea, and in some years peculiar wind con- 

 ditions will keep it there at all seasons, but often this region in 

 which I expected the Sachs to be employed is quite ice-free after 

 the early spring is over. 



Besides Murray, McKinlay too should have been elsewhere. If 

 he were to be on the Karluk he should, of course, have had with 

 him all his magnetic equipment, some of which was now on the 

 Alaska. Most inappropriate of all was the presence of the two 

 anthropologists, Beuchat and Jenness. They had been taken 

 aboard because the Karluk was not only the safest but the swiftest 

 conveyance for Herschel Island. Murray was to land there with 

 his equipment to wait for the Mary Sachs, and Beuchat and Jenness 

 to study the Eskimos, not only for what information they could 

 put on record, but also for the value to themselves of becoming 

 quickly used to the ways and, if possible, to the language of the 



