134 THE LAST VOYAGE OF THE KARLUK 
island to see the land clearly and in detail but 
though he looked constantly with binoculars he could 
see no one on the island nor any tent or other in¬ 
dication that men were there, so he concluded that 
the mate and his party had carried out their orders 
and gone on to Wrangell Island. This seemed 
likely to me and I hoped that it was so. The 
Eskimo had improved the time in shooting and suc¬ 
ceeded in getting four seal. 
On the way back the trail was faulted in places 
and the party had difficulty in finding it. When 
about twenty miles from Herald Island on their 
return trip they had come upon the Mackay party, 
struggling towards the land. Mackay, Murray 
and Morris were drawing the sledge; Beuchat was a 
mile and a half behind, with hands and feet frozen 
and partly delirious from suffering. Morris had 
cut his left hand with a knife and blood-poisoning 
had already set in. Chafe’s opinion was that Beu¬ 
chat would die that night. He said that Beuchat 
expressed his sorrow that he had left the main 
party. The Mackay party had taken their pem- 
mican out of the tins before they left Shipwreck 
Camp and put it all in a bag; in going over some 
young ice their sledge had got into the water and 
the bag of pemmican had got wet. Altogether 
they were in bad shape. Chafe offered them 
