224 FARTHEST NORTH 



help the dogs with the sledges. Added to this, if the 

 weather be thick, as yesterday, one is apt to run into the 

 largest ridges or snow-drifts without seeing them ; every- 

 thing is equally white under its covering of new snow, 

 and the light comes from all directions, so that it throws 

 no shadows. Then one plunges in headlong, and with 

 difficulty can get up and on to one's snow-shoes again. 

 This takes place continually, and the longer it lasts the 

 worse it gets. At last one literally staggers on one's 

 snow-shoes from fatigue, just as if one were drunk. But 

 we are ofaininsf Q:round, and that is the chief thinq;, be 

 one's shins ever so bruised and tender. This manner 

 of progress is particularly injurious to the ankles, on 

 account of the constant unsteadiness and swerving of 

 the snow-shoes, and many a day have mine been much 

 swollen. The dogs, too, are becoming exhausted, which 

 is worse. 



" I have to-day reckoned out the observations made 

 yesterday, and find, to our joy, that the longitude is 6i° 

 27' E., so that we have not drifted westward, but have 

 come about south, according to our course. My con- 

 stant fear of drifting past land is thus unfounded, and 

 we should be able to reckon on reaching it before very 

 long. We may possibly be farther east than we suppose, 

 but hardly farther west, so that if we now go due south 

 for a while, and then southwest, we must meet with land, 

 and this within not many days. I reckon that we did 20 

 miles southward yesterday, and should thus be now in 



