132 
RETURN OF DEPOT PARTY. 
They had made a creditable journey, and were, on the 
whole, in good condition. They had no injuries worth 
talking about, although not a man had escaped some 
touches of the frost. Bonsall was minus a big toe-nail, 
and plus a scar upon the nose. McGary had attempted, 
as Tom Hickey told us, to pluck a fox, it being so frozen 
as to defy skinning by his knife; and his fingers had 
been tolerably frost-bitten in the operation. “They’re 
very horny, sir, are my fingers,” said McGary, who was 
worn down to a mere shadow of his former rotundity; 
“very horny, and they water up like bladders.” The 
rest had suffered in their feet; but, like good fellows, 
postponed limping until they reached the ship. 
Within the last three days they had marched fifty- 
four miles, or eighteen a day. Their sledge being 
empty, and the young ice north of Cape Bancroft 
smooth as a mirror, they had travelled, the day before 
we met them, nearly twenty-five miles. A very re¬ 
markable pace for men who had been twenty-eight 
days in the field. 
My supplies of hot food, coffee, and marled beef 
soup, which I had brought with me, were very oppor¬ 
tune. They had almost exhausted their bread; and, 
being unwilling to encroach on the depot stores, had 
gone without fuel in order to save alcohol. Leaving 
orders to place my own sledge stores in cache , I re¬ 
turned to the brig, ahead of the party, with my dog- 
sledge, carrying Mr. Bonsall with me. 
On this return I had much less difficulty with the 
