A HARD STRUGGLE 189 



saw the track of an animal in the snow. It was that of a 

 fox, came about W. S. W. true, and went in an easterly 

 direction. The trail was quite fresh. What in the 

 world was that fox doing up here } There were also 

 unequivocal signs that it had not been entirely without 

 food. Were we in the vicinity of land } Involuntarily 

 I looked round for it, but the weather was thick all day 

 yesterday, and we might have been near it without 

 seeing it. It is just as probable, however, that this 

 fox was following up some bear. In any case, a warm- 

 blooded mammal in the eighty-fifth parallel ! We had 

 not eone far when we came across another fox-track ; 

 it went in about the same direction as the other, and 

 followed the trend of the land which had stopped us, 

 and by which we had been obliged to camp. It is 

 incomprehensible what these animals live on up here, but 

 presumably they are able to snap up some crustacean 

 in the open waterways. But why do they leave the 

 coasts ? That is what puzzles me most. Can they 

 have gone astray ? There seems little probability of that. 

 I am eager to see if we may not come across the trail 

 of a bear to-day. It would be quite a pleasure, and it 

 would seem as if we were getting nearer inhabited regions 

 again. I have just pricked out our course on the chart 

 accordin"- to our bearino-s, calculatino- that we have o-one 

 69 miles in the four days since our last observation, 

 and I do not think this can be excessive. According to 

 this, it should not be much more than 138 miles to 



