3o6 FARTHEST NORTH 



many clays ! But before we have time to look round there 

 will be a cold wind with snow, a crust will form, and again 

 we must wait. I am too used to disappointment to believe 

 in anything". This is a school of patience; but neverthe- 

 less the rain has put us in good spirits. 



" The days drag wearily by. We work in an inter- 

 mittent way at the kayak grips of wood for our sledges, 

 and at calking and painting our kayaks to make them 

 water-tight. The painting, however, causes me a good 

 deal of trouble. I burned bones here for many days till 

 the whole place smelled like the bone-dust works at 

 Lysaker; then came the toilsome process of pounding 

 and grating them to make them perfectly fine and even. 

 The bone-dust was thereupon mixed with train-oil, and 

 at last I got as far as a trial, but the paint proved 

 uncompromisingly to be perfectly useless. So now I 

 must mix it with soot, as I had first intended, and add 

 more oil. I am now occupied in smoking the place out 

 in my attempts to make soot ; but all my exertions, when 

 it comes to collecting" it, only result in a little pinch, 

 although the smoke towered in the air, and they might 

 have seen it in Spitzbergen. There is a great deal to do 

 battle with when one has not a shop next door. What 

 would I not give for a little bucket of oil-paint, only com- 

 mon lampblack! Well, well; we shall find a way out of 

 the difficulty eventually, but meanwhile we are growing 

 like sweeps. 



" On Wednesday evening ' Haren' was killed ; poor 



