198 THE LAST VOYAGE OF THE KARLUK 
I think he still rather hoped that the land we saw 
was not Siberia but a new island, so that he might 
postpone as long as possible the horrible fate he 
was convinced was in store for him. 
From the time we started that morning we had 
leads of water and treacherous young ice to contend 
with. In some places we could get across easily; 
in others we had to make wide detours. At noon 
we stopped on the north side of a narrow lead and 
Kataktovick made a little snow igloo to serve as 
shelter while we rested for awhile. He under¬ 
stood perfectly how to use the Primus stove and he 
made some tea. While he was doing this I recon- 
noitered to the eastward, walking probably two 
miles before I came to a point where we could cross. 
When I returned to the sledge the Eskimo had the 
tea ready and we found it most refreshing. We 
could always eat bear meat whenever we were hun¬ 
gry. It got frozen on the sledge, of course, but 
with a knife or a hatchet we would chip off small 
pieces, or sometimes we would thaw it out by roll¬ 
ing it up in our shirts and letting our bodily heat 
melt the frost. 
We now went on to the eastward to the point I 
had selected for crossing the lead. There was 
young ice here but it was not very strong, so we 
had to adopt our customary expedient of pulling 
the sledge over and back lightly loaded. Once 
