900 



THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



party. My last words to him were : "Be 

 careful of the leads, my boy." 



The party from this point comprised 

 9 men, 7 sledges, and 60 dogs. The con- 

 ditions at this camp and the apparently 

 unbroken expanse of fairly level ice in 

 every direction reminded me of Cagni's 

 description of his farthest north, but I 

 was not deceived by the apparently 

 favorable outlook, for favorable condi- 

 tions never continue for any distance or 

 any length of time in the Arctic regions. 



The north march was very good going, 

 but for the first time since leaving land 

 we experienced that condition, frequent 

 over these ice fields, of a hazy atmos- 

 phere in which the light is equal every- 

 where. All relief is destroyed, and it is 

 impossible to see for any distance. 



We were obliged in this march to make 

 a detour around an open lead. In the 

 next march we encountered the heaviest 

 and deepest snow of the journey through 

 a thick, smothering mantle lying in the 

 depressions of heavy rubble ice. I came 

 upon Bartlett and his party, fagged out 

 and temporarily discouraged by the 

 heart-racking work of making a road. 



I knew what was the matter with them. 

 They were simply spoiled by the good 

 going on the previous marches. I ral- 

 lied them a bit, lightened their sledges, 

 and set them on encouraged again. 



During the next march we traveled 

 through a thick haze, drifting over the 

 ice before a biting air from the northeast. 

 At the end of the march we came upon 

 the captain camped beside a wide-open 

 lead, with a dense black water sky north- 

 west, north, and northeast. We built 

 our igloos and turned in, but before I 

 had fallen asleep I was roused out by a 

 movement of the ice, and found a start- 

 ling condition of affairs. 



A rapidly widening road of black 

 water ran but a few feet from our igloos. 

 One of my teams of dogs had escaped by 

 only a few feet from being dragged by 

 the movement in the ice into the water. 



Another team had an equally narrow 

 escape from being crushed by the ice 

 blocks piled over them. The ice on the 

 north side of the lead was moving- around 



eastward. The small floes on which were 

 the captain's igloos were drifting east- 

 ward in the open water, and the side of 

 our igloos threatened to follow suit. 



Kicking out the door of the igloos, I 

 called to the captain's men to pack their 

 sledges and be ready for a quick dash 

 when a favorable change arrived. 



We hurried our things on our sledges,, 

 hitched the dogs, and moved on to a. 

 large floe west of us. Then leaving one- 

 man to look out for the dogs and sledges,, 

 we hurried over to assist the captain's- 

 party to join us. 



A corner of their raft impinged on the- 

 ice on our side for the rest of the night,, 

 and during the next day the ice suffered 

 the torments of the damned, surging to- 

 gether, opening out, groaning and grind- 

 ing, while the open water belched black- 

 smoke like a prairie fire. Then the mo- 

 tion ceased, the open water closed, the 

 atmosphere to the north was cleared, and 

 we rushed across before the ice should 

 open again. 



A succession of literally open leads- 

 were crossed, and after them some heavy 

 old ice, and then we came to a layer of 

 young ice, some of which buckled under 

 our sledges, and this gave us a straight 

 way of six miles to the north. Then 

 came more heavy old floes covered with 

 hard snow. This was a good, long 

 march. 



The next march was a long one. It 

 was Bartlett's last hit. He let himself 

 out over a series of large old floes, stead- 

 ily increasing in diameter and covered 

 with hard snow. 



During the last few miles I walked be- 

 side him or in advance. He was very 

 solemn and anxious to go further, but 

 the programme was for him to go back 

 from here in command of the fourth sup- 

 porting party, and there were no sup- 

 plies for an increase in the main party. 



In this march we encountered a high 

 wind for the first time since the three 

 days after we left Cape Columbia. It 

 was dead on our faces, bitter and insist- 

 ent, but I had no reason to complain ; it 

 was better than an easterly or southerly 

 wind, either of which would have set us 



