214 FARTHEST NORTH 



alono- it before we found a crossino- and could aQ-ain 

 keep to our course no one could tell ; but the 

 probability was a long time — perhaps days. On the 

 other hand, to retreat in the direction whence we came 

 seemed an unattractive alternative ; it would lead us 

 away from our goal, and also perhaps necessitate a long- 

 journey in an opposite direction before we could find a 

 crossing. The pool extended true S. 50' W. To follow 

 it would undoubtedly take us out of our course, which 

 ought now properly to be east of south ; but on the 

 whole this direction was nearest the line of our advance, 

 and consequently we decided to try it. After a short 

 time we came to a new lane running in a transverse di- 

 rection to the pool. Here the ice was strong enough to 

 bear, and on examining the ice on the pool itself beyond 

 the confluence of this lane I found a belt where the 

 young ice had, through pressure, been jammed up in 

 several layers. This happily was strong enough to bear, 

 and we got safely over the pool, the trend of which we 

 had been prepared to follow for days. Then on w^e went 

 again, though in toil and tribulation, until at half -past 

 eight in the evening we again found ourselves con- 

 fronted by a pool or lane of exactly the same description 

 as the former one, with the exception only that this time 

 the view to the ' sea ' opened towards the northeast, while 

 in the southwest the sky-line was closed in by ice. The 

 lane also was covered with young ice, which in the mid- 

 dle was obviously of the same age as that on the last 



