THE BOAT JOURNEY 
to tlie north-west and threatened another blow. We had 
sighted in the meantime a big indentation which I thought 
must be King Haakon Bay, and I decided that we must land 
there. We set the bows of the boat towards the bay and ran 
before the freshening gale. Soon we had angry reefs on either 
side. Great glaciers came down to the sea and offered no 
landing-place. The sea spouted on the reefs and thundered 
against the shore. About noon we sighted a line of jagged reef, 
like blackened teeth, that seemed to bar the entrance to the 
bay. Inside, comparatively smooth water stretched eight or 
nine miles to the head of the bay. A gap in the reef appeared, 
and we made for it. But the fates had another rebuff for us. 
The wind shifted and blew from the east right out of the bay. 
We could see the way through the reef, but we could not 
approach it directly. That afternoon we bore up, tacking five 
times in the strong wind. The last tack enabled xxs to get 
through, and at last we were in the wide mouth of the bay. 
Dusk was approaching. A small cove, vnth. a boulder-strewn 
beach guarded by a reef, made a break in the cliffs on the south 
side of the bay, and we turned in that direction. I stood in 
the bows directing the steering as we ran through the kelp 
and made the passage of the reef. The entrance was so narrow 
that we had to take in the oars, and the swell was piling itself 
right over the reef into the cove ; but in a minute or two we 
were inside, and in the gathering darkness the James Caird ran 
in on a swell and touched the beach. I sprang ashore with the 
short painter and held on when the boat Avent out with the back- 
ward surge. When the James Caird came in again three of the 
men got ashore, and they held the painter while I climbed some 
rocks with another line. A slip on the wet rocks twenty feet up 
nearly closed my part of the story just at the moment when we 
were achieving safety. A jagged piece of rock held me and 
at the same time bruised me sorely. However, I made fast 
the line, and in a few minutes we were all safe on the beach, 
\vith the boat floating in the surging water just off the shore. 
We heard a gurgling sound that was sweet music in our ears, 
and; peering around, found a stream of fresh water almost 
at our feet. A moment later we were down on our knees 
179 
