THROUGH THE PRESSURE RIDGE 157 
quantity of supplies as possible. This meant relay¬ 
ing supplies, because the going was bad and made 
sledging difficult, with the small number of dogs we 
had. On the sixth, as soon as the first streak of 
light appeared, I sent Munro and his party 
back again to meet the McKinlay party, while 1 
took Kataktovick and Kerdrillo and went ahead 
towards the island, road-making with our pickaxes. 
Munro had told me that when he first saw the three- 
mile belt of raftered ice, he never thought for a 
moment that we should ever get through it. Any 
novice certainly had a right to feel discouraged; 
it was as tough a job as I ever tackled. We now 
picked our way—I might almost say pick-axed our 
way—across the ice from our last camp for a dis¬ 
tance of seven miles until we came to a large, heavy 
floe, which would make a good place for a new 
camp; here we threw off the light loads which we 
had brought on two of the Peary sledges and re¬ 
turned to camp. At half past four the McKinlay 
party came in, convoyed by Munro and his party. 
McKinlay and his companions had gone clear back to 
Shipwreck Camp and brought in six cases of dog 
pemmican, sixteen cases of Hudson’s Bay pemmi- 
can, thirty gallons of gasoline, and some hatchets 
and snow-knives. They had left at the first camp 
from Shipwreck Camp four cases of Underwood 
dog pemmican and ten tins of Hudson’s Bay pern- 
