262 FARTHEST NORTH 



When we shall see the end of it I can no longer form 

 any idea ; I only hope whatever may be in store for us 

 is not very far off, open water or land — Wilczek Land, 

 Zichy Land, Spitzbergen, or some other country. 



" Yesterday was not quite so bad a day as I expected. 

 We really did advance, though not very far — hardly more 

 than a couple of miles — but we must be content with 

 that at this time of year. The dogs could not manage 

 to draw the sledges alone ; if there was nobody beside 

 them they stopped at every other step. The only thing 

 to be done was to make a journey to and fro, and thus 

 go over the ground three times. While I went on ahead 

 to explore, Johansen drove the sledges as far as he 

 could ; first mine, and then back again after his own. By 

 that time I had returned and dro\-e my own sledge as far 

 as I had found a wa\- ; and then this performance was 

 repeated all over again. It was not rapid progress, but 

 progress it was of a kind, and that was something. The 

 ice we are going over is anything but even ; it is still 

 rather massive and old, with hummocks and irregularities 

 in every direction, and no real fiat tracts. When, added 

 to this, after going a short distance, we came to a place 

 where the ice was broken up into small fioes, with high 

 ridges and broad lanes filled with slush and brash, so 

 that the whole thing looked like a single mass of. debris, 

 where there was hardly standing-room, to say nothing of 

 any prospect of advance, it was only human to lose cour- 

 age and give up, for the time being, trying to get on. 



