INTRODUCTION XXXxi 
which was based upon the Eskimo type. Cooking appara- 
tus, food, tents, clothing and the thousand and one details 
of equipment without which no journey nowadays stands 
much chance of success, all date back to Nansen in the im- 
mediate past, though beyond him of course is the experi- 
ence of centuries of travellers. As Nansen himself wrote 
of the English polar men: “‘ How well was their equipment 
thought out and arranged with the means they had at their 
disposal! Truly, there is nothing new under the sun. 
Most of what I prided myself upon, and what I thought to 
be new, I find they had anticipated. M‘Clintock used the 
same things forty years ago. It was not their fault that they 
were born in a country where the use of snowshoes is un- 
known... .’’? 
All the more honour to the men who dared so much and 
travelled so far with the limited equipment of the past. 
The real point for us is that, just as Scott is the Father of 
Antarctic sledge travelling, so Nansen may be considered 
the modern Father of it all. 
Nansen and Johansen started on March 14 when the 
Fram was in latitude 84° 4’ N., and the sun had only re- 
turned a few days before, with three sledges (two of which 
carried kayaks) and 28 dogs. They reached their northern- 
most camp on April 8, which Nansen has given in his 
book as being in latitude 86° 13.6’ N. But Nansen tells 
me that Professor Geelmuyden, who had his astronomical 
results and his diary, reckoned that owing to refraction 
the horizon was lifted, and if so the observation had to be 
reduced accordingly. Nansen therefore gave the reduced 
latitude in his book, but he considers that his horizon was 
very clear when he took that observation, and believes that 
his latitude was higher than that given. He used a sextant 
and the natural horizon. 
They turned, and travelling back round pressed-up ice 
and open leads they failed to find the land they had been 
led to expect in latitude 83°, which indeed was proved to 
be non-existent. At the end of June they started using 
the kayaks, which needed many repairs after their rough 
1 Nansen, Farthest North, vol. ii. pp. 19-20. 
