THE WINTER PARTY 4I 



I was mistaken, however, for very soon it was blowing so hard and with so 

 much 'drift' that I could not see my dogs. It was evident that we were not 

 going to get back stemming that wind and drift so I got ahead of the team 

 and led them up over the top of the hill 180 feet high. They followed like 

 lambs and pulled the komatik up like little Trojans. We careered down the 

 other side and found it was much better as far as drifting snow was concerned, 

 but the wind was so strong that we had to lean against it. We got back to 

 camp by i ^30, and on getting up to the camp saw two of Dennis' dogs there 

 and so thought he must have got back before me. I could not see his komatik 

 anywhere, though, and realised that one of his dogs had slipped its trace and 

 run back to camp and that he was out in the gale with only four dogs. I went 

 over the crest of the hill to look for him and told Marlowe not to unharness 

 my team as, if he was a long way off, I would go out with my team and bring 

 him back. I met him, however, just coming up the hill and gave him a hand 

 home. He was breathing fire and murder about his leader, Lively, as he 

 thought he had gone back to Nain again, as he had done on Friday. He was 

 very surprised to find him in camp and forgave him. The other dog, Frank, 

 I knew he had left in camp as it was sore under the forelegs. We were all 

 glad to get back and get into our tents out of the wind. 



8th January. It was still blowing when we turned out so 1 decided to wait 

 and see what the weather was going to do, as the barometer was going down 

 and it looked as though anything might happen. 



On going over to the snow house we found to our horror that the water 

 had quored up inside and my guns, harnesses, plane tables, cartridges and 

 other odds and ends were standing in about six inches of half-frozen water. 

 Dennis crawled in and chipped all the gear out and passed it out. We shifted 

 all the surveying gear to a little dip on the opposite bank of the pond that 

 we were now camped on. It looked as though the snow was good enough 

 to build another snow house so we all set to work and had one up by lunch 

 time. It was made more or less in the correct way and was roofed 'a la 

 Eskimo' and was a great success, thanks chiefly to Dennis who did most of 

 the building. 



The wind was dying away so we had a hurried lunch and got away by about 

 1300. We had a good afternoon surveying as the wind died away completely. 

 1 did not get back till dark, and we plotted and inked-in in the igloo again 

 and by the time I came out it was snowing. The barometer was falling fast and 

 looked as though we should have bad weather in the near future so we 

 decided that, if it was not surveyable weather on the morrow, we would 

 pack up and go back to the base. 



Sure enough the weather was bad and the party struggled back 

 to Nain. 



There was plenty of work to occupy the time of the surveyors 

 when they returned to the base camp after a week or two in the 

 field. It seemed that whenever it was decided to establish another 



