226 FARTHEST NORTH 



evening the dark heavens before us augured open water 

 of a worse kind. The reflection was particularly dark and 

 threatening, both in the west and in the east. By 7 

 o'clock I could see a broad lane before us, stretching 

 away west and east as far as the eye could reach from the 

 highest hummock. It was broad, and appeared to be 

 more impracticable than any of the previous ones. As 

 the dogs were tired, our day's march had been a good 

 one, and we had a splendid camping-place ready to hand, 

 we decided to pitch the tent. Well satisfied and certain 

 that we were now in latitude 82^", and that land must 

 inevitably be near, we disappeared into the bag. 



" During breakfast this morning I went out and took 

 a meridian altitude. It proves that we have not deceived 

 ourselves. We are in latitude 82° 30' N., perhaps even 

 a minute or two farther south. But it is growing more 

 and more remarkable that we see no sign of land. I can- 

 not explain it in any other way than that we are some 

 degrees farther east than we suppose.* That we should 

 be so much farther west as to enable us to pass entirely 

 clear of Petermann's Land and Oscar's Land, and not so 

 much as get a glimpse of them, I consider an impossi- 

 bility. I have again looked at our former observations ; 

 have again gone through our dead reckoning, the velocity 



* In point of fact, we were then about 6^ farther east than we thought. 

 I had on April 14th, it will be remembered (compare my notes for that 

 day), surmised that the longitude I then set down (86" E.) was more west- 

 erly than that we were actually in. 



