THE FRIENDLY ARCTIC 119 



telling him distinctly that he was not doing that in obedience to 

 any instructions from me but that these garments were presents 

 from him to Storkerson. Storkerson could not say too much of 

 the help given him by Captain Cottle, Mr. Mott and, in fact, 

 every one on the ships Belvedere and Polar Bear. But neither of 

 these ships had dogs and one of Storkerson's great difficulties had 

 been inability to hire dogs and sledges for freighting supplies from 

 the Belvedere (about twenty-five miles away). He and the men 

 he had been able to hire from the Belvedere and some Eskimos who 

 were working for him had been compelled to harness themselves to 

 the sledges, taking the place of dogs in hauling them. The very fact 

 that they had to do this while several teams of the expedition's 

 dogs stood fat and idle in the barns at Collinson Point, had done 

 a great deal with the Eskimos to undermine my credit, for it 

 seemed obvious to them from these circumstances that I was no 

 longer in any control of the equipment or supplies of the expedition, 

 ^rom this they deduced that I should probably not be able to pay 

 ihem if they worked for me, for, of course, Eskimos usually expect 

 to be paid in goods. 



With the friendship and help of the whalers on the Belvedere 

 and the party of sportsmen on the Polar Bear I might almost have 

 ignored the Collinson Point difficulty and saved the precious time 

 it took to go there (for the season was getting late) and started 

 off on the ice directly. But I could not do this for two reasons: 

 First, we needed the rifles, ammunition, light tents, scientific equip- 

 ment, cameras, etc., which were in our stores and could not be se- 

 cured from whalers. Further, for any journey out over the ice I 

 should need the cooperation of the various ships the following 

 summer, and I could not leave shore before making definite ar- 

 rangements for the movements of the three vessels, and especially 

 those of the North Star, for she was the one I had bought for the 

 purpose of cooperating in my explorations of the Beaufort Sea. 

 If I left shore while my authority was being openly defied I could 

 rely on no cooperation from the ships in future — any written orders 

 I might send would presumably be treated like the ones already 

 disobeyed. Especially I must arrange for the North Star to follow 

 me to Banks Island, for that had become an integral part of my 

 ilans. 



i On the way from Martin Point to Collinson Point Captain 



[Bernard and I spent the night with Crawford in his cabin at the 



iiouth of the Ulahula River. I found then that while both he 



md Captain Bernard had at one time been dubious as to which 



