466 •!• Lindhard. 



Peyer describes his cases would lead us to suppose that he has observed 

 the same symptoms. Tlie same symptoms are also given by В rønlund 

 as characteristic of the illness which result from eating the liver of Phoca 

 barbata. 



It may be remarked further that 5 of the members of the "Dan- 

 mark Expedition" suffered from severe headache in the following win- 

 ter after eating seal liver. In several respects the pains resembled those 

 resulting from the poisoning by the bear liver. 



During the "light period" we also made acquaintance with 

 one of the usual plagues of polar travellers, the s n о w - b 1 i n d n e s s 

 or 1 i g h t - с n j u n с t i V i t i s. The snow-spectacles of the Expedi- 

 tion were bad and many did not use them therefore, a carelessness which 

 was not long in being punished. The cases were numerous, but treat- 

 ment with cocaine and exclusion of the light soon cured them all 

 in a relatively short time. It was remarkable how most found 

 it difficult to recognise the ürst symptoms; it was thought as 

 a rule that a reindeer hair, which were abundant everywhere, had 

 got into the eye. The eyes were rubbed therefore and the attempt made 

 to take the supposed hair out; it was only when the eye could no longer 

 be held open that recourse was had to the snow-spectacles. 



On our journeys also we experienced the often spoken-of "p о 1 a r 

 t h i r s t", an unpleasant experience which has an extremely different 

 effect on different individuals but which certainly has a real basis, as 

 one is exposed to a considerable loss of moisture through respiration 

 in the relatively very dry air. To this must be added that the severe 

 work on the sledge-journeys gives rise to a very considerable transpi- 

 ration in addition to forcing the respiration. 



During the long, northward sledge-journey in the summer of 1907 

 a case of sickness occurred, the nature of which is not quite clear to 

 me and which 1 only know from a later description. It affected the 

 two Danish members on the 2nd sledge-party during their stay on Peary 

 Land; the symptoms were: soreness of the gums, constipation and great 

 weakness, or perhaps more correctly, almost insurmountable feeling of 

 tiredness. The symptoms began immediately after the goal of their 

 journey had been reached; for a week they had lived chiefly on raw, 

 frozen, musk-ox flesh, which was quite devoid of fat, perhaps also slightly 

 gone bad; they had themselves the feeling that they wanted fat. When 

 later they shot a seal, they drank eagerly of the running oil in large 

 quantities and found themselves very much better for doing so. It is 

 doubtful perhaps if the three symptoms mentioned belong to the same 

 sickness. Sore gums are scarcely remarkable when one is living chiefly 

 on frozen meat. And the state of "slackness" may readily be explained 

 as a reaction after the severe tension in pushing on to their goal. There 

 can scarcely be any talk of any considerable physical exhaustion; when 

 they reached the ship 3 weeks later after a very forced return jnurncy, 



