204 MY ARCTIC JOURNAL 



direction without success, there was no doubt left that poor 

 Verhoeff had lost his life in an effort to cross the ice-stream. 

 Mr. Peary cached enough provisions to last one man a year, 

 at Cairn Point, in case Verhoeff should, in some miraculous 

 way, return after the "Kite's" departure. 



It was with a feeling akin to homesickness that I took the 

 pictures and ornaments from the walls of our little room, pulled 

 down the curtains from the windows and bed, had Matt pack 

 the books and nail them up, sorted the things on the bed, and 

 packed those I wanted to keep. The tins and cooking utensils 

 I put on the stone and turf wall just outside of my room pre- 

 vious to distributing them among the natives. 



My trunk packed and removed, the carpet up and the cur- 

 tains down, the improvised bookcase taken to pieces, and it 

 was hard to imagine that this dismantled room had once been 

 as snug and comfortable as any boudoir in the world. Could 

 the walls talk they would tell of some very pleasant hours 

 spent there by the members of the North Greenland Expe- 

 dition of 1891-92, and of many months of real solid comfort 

 and happiness enjoyed by the woman who, when she left home 

 and friends, was told over and over again that she must ex- 

 pect to endure all kinds of hardships, to suffer agony from 

 that dreaded Arctic enemy, scurvy, etc. 



I next turned my attention to the various articles put aside 

 for the P^skimos, and after sorting them over I called all the 

 women in the settlement to me, and stood them in a row. 

 There were nine among them, including the two brides (mere 



