336 Arctic and Antarctic Exploration [parti 
in the day, and - 40 0 Fahr. at night. Furious gales of 
wind were frequent. 
The summit was 8250 ft. above the sea, and from 
September 17th there was a pronounced fall to the 
westward. Sail was now set on the sledges, portions of 
the tent being used for that purpose. This day a snow 
bunting was seen. The crevasses and fissures again began 
to appear, and on the 20th the summits of the western 
Greenland mountains were in sight. The sermik suak or 
inland ice thus proved to be a vast extent of smooth 
level snow with a margin of broken and fissured ice. 
The head of the Ameralik-fjord was at length reached 
after 40 days on the inland ice. 
The explorers were still sixty miles from the Danish 
settlement of Godthaab, and it was decided that while 
Nansen and Sverdrup constructed a boat and went down 
the fjord the rest should proceed by land. The framework 
of the boat consisted of two bamboos and a ski staff. 
The difficulty was the ribs, which were made of the 
branches of the dwarf willows growing on the banks of 
the fjord, and the canvas covering them entailed much 
labour in sewing with a sailmaker's needle as they were 
without a "palm." The oars were bamboos with forked 
willow-branches with canvas stretched across. It was a 
fairly good boat, and only required baling every ten 
minutes. After a great feast on cranberries the two 
explorers started and managed to make their way in her 
to Godthaab. The others also arrived safely, and all 
were very hospitably received for the winter, returning 
to Norway in the following year. 
It was a splendid achievement. The central water- 
parting was found to be 125 miles from the east, and 226 
from the west side, the greatest elevation measured being 
8970 ft. Supposing the average land surface under the ice 
to rise to 2000 ft., the thickness of the ice-cap would be 
nearly 7000 ft. The excavating power of the glaciers is 
enormous, and the pressure causing the melting of the 
snow and the discharge of an enormous quantity of 
water into the sea, counteracts any increase above caused 
by the excessive precipitation occurring from the warm 
winds blowing from the sea. Nansen found the moisture 
to be so great as to be near saturation. Out of 40 days 
