i66 FARTHEST NORTH 



Sverdrup ; it was he who had fired. Soon Blessing 

 joined us, but all the others had long since left their 

 posts. While Blessing went back to the boat and his 

 botanizing box, Sverdrup and I went on to try our luck 

 once more. A little farther south we came to a valley 

 stretching right across the island. On the farther side 

 of it we saw a man standing on a hillock, and not far 

 from him a herd of five or six reindeer. As it never 

 occurred to us to doubt that the man was in the act of 

 stalking these, we avoided going in that direction, and 

 soon he and his reindeer disappeared to the west. I 

 heard afterwards that he had never seen the deer. As 

 it was evident that when the reindeer to the south of us 

 were startled they would have to come back across this 

 valley, and as the island at this part was so narrow that 

 we commanded the whole of it, we determined to take 

 up our posts here and wait. We accordingly got in the 

 lee of some great boulders, out of the wind. In front of 

 Sverdrup was a large flock of geese, near the mouth of 

 the stream, close down by the shore. They kept up an 

 incessant gabble, and the temptation to have a shot at 

 them was very great ; but, considering the reindeer, we 

 thought it best to leave them in peace. They gabbled 

 and waddled away down through the mud and soon took 

 wing. 



The time seemed long. At first we listened with all 

 our ears — the reindeer must come very soon — and our 

 eyes wandered incessantly backward and forward along 



