154 THE LAST VOYAGE OF THE KARLUK 
was by this time barely able to carry it, my heart 
smote me and I relented. Templeman said he was 
sorry he had gone astray but that he had really 
wanted to do a little scouting by himself. That is 
the worst temptation in the Arctic; when you send 
a man out by himself he may go astray and when 
he realizes that he has lost his way, instead of at¬ 
tempting to retrace his steps, he continues on. I 
was delighted to see Templeman and to know that 
he was safely with us again. 
At daylight the next morning the chief engineer 
and I began sledging supplies over the road already 
built from the camp to the level floe in the midst 
of the rafters. The rest of the party continued 
the road-building beyond the floe. We made 
three trips, with two sledges and eight dogs, and 
made a good beginning at the transportation of 
our supplies on the way towards land. We saw 
several bear tracks and some seal holes in the ice. 
I sent Kerdrillo and Kataktovick on through the 
rafters, to report on ice conditions; they found that 
the going got better as they got further across the 
rafters which, where we were working, were like a 
small mountain range. Building a road across 
them was like making the Overland Trail through 
the Rockies. 
I have always regretted that I took no photo- 
