5IO FARTHEST NORTH 



I work indefatigably day after day till late in the night, 

 it is mostly duty work, and I am not sorry when it is 

 finished, to go and lie for some few hours in my berth 

 reading a novel and smoking a cigar. With what exul- 

 tation would I not throw the whole aside, spring up, and 

 lay hold of real life, fighting my way over ice and sea 

 with sledges, boats, or kayaks ! It is more than true that 

 it is ' easy to live a life of battle ' ; but here there is neither 

 storm nor battle, and I thirst after them. I long to en- 

 list titanic forces and fight my way forward — that would 

 be living ! But what pleasure is there in strength when 

 there is nothing for it to do t Here we drift forward, and 

 here we drift back, and now we have been two months 

 on the same spot. 



" Everything, however, is being got ready for a possible 

 expedition, or for the contingency of its becoming neces- 

 sary to abandon the ship. All the hand-sledges are 

 lashed together, and the iron fittings carefully seen to. 

 Six dog-sledges are also being made, and to-morrow we 

 shall begin building kayaks ready for the men. They 

 are easy to draw on hand-sledges in case of a retreat 

 over the ice without the ship. For a beginning we are 

 making kayaks to hold two men each. I intend to have 

 them about 12 feet long, 3 feet wide, and 18 inches in 

 depth. Six of these are to be made. They are to be 

 covered with sealskin or sail-cloth, and to be decked all 

 over, except for two holes — one for each man. 



" I feel that we have, or rather shall have, everything 



