VOYAGE THROUGH THE KARA SEA 225 



strike "a seal-hook into it to hold it up. The hook 

 slipped, however, and the animal sank before we could 

 save it. While we were towing our booty to an ice-fioe 

 we were still, for part of the time at least, surrounded 

 by walruses; but there was no use in shooting any 

 more, for we had no means of carrying them off. The 

 Fram presently came up and took our two on board, 

 and we were soon going ahead along the coast. We saw 

 many walruses in this part. We shot two others in the 

 afternoon, and could have got many more if we had had 

 time to spare. It was in this same neighborhood that 

 Nordenskiold also saw one or two small herds. 



We now continued our course, against a strong cur- 

 rent, southward along the coast, past the mouth of the 

 Chatanga. This eastern part of the Taimur Peninsula 

 is a comparatively high, mountainous region, but with a 

 lower level stretch between the mountains and the sea — 

 apparently the same kind of low land we had seen along 

 the coast almost the whole way. As the sea seemed to 

 be tolerably open and free from ice, we made several 

 attempts to shorten our course by leaving the coast and 

 striking across for the mouth of the Olenek ; but every 

 time thick ice drove us back to our channel by the land. 



On September 14th we were off the land lying be- 

 tween the Chatanga and the Anabara. This also was 

 fairly high, mountainous country, with a low strip by the 

 sea. " In this respect," so I write in my diary, " this 



whole coast reminds one very much of Jaederen, in Nor- 

 15 



