BY SLEDGE AND KAYAK 265 



Wherever I turned the way was closed, and it looked as 

 if advance was denied us for good. To launch the 

 kayaks would be of no avail, for we could hardly expect 

 to propel them through this accumulation of fragments, 

 and I was on the point of making up my mind to wait 

 and try our luck with the net and -line, and see if we 

 could not manaq;e to find a seal somewhere in these 

 lanes. 



" These are moments full of anxiety, when from some 

 hummock one looks doubtingly over the ice, one's 

 thoughts continually reverting to the same question : 

 have w^e provisions enough to w^ait for the time when the 

 snow will have melted and the ice have become slacker 

 and more intersected with lanes, so that one can row be- 

 tween the floes .f* Or is there any probability of our be- 

 ine able to obtain sufificient food, if that which we have 

 should fall short ? These are great and important ques- 

 tions which I cannot yet answer for certain. That it will 

 take a long time before all this snow melts away and ad- 

 vance becomes fairly practicable is certain ; at what time 

 the ice may become slacker, and progress by means of the 

 lanes possible, we cannot say ; and up to this we have 

 taken nothing, with the exception of two ivory gulls and 

 a small fish. We did, indeed, see another fish swimming- 

 near the surface of the water, but it was no larger than 

 the other. Where we are just now there seems to be 

 little prospect of capturing anything. I have not seen a 

 single seal the last few days; though yesterday I saw the 



