Barrier.  A great part of this excavation had to be done with axes, as we soon came to the bare ice.  One of these dog tents, when finished, had quite an important appearance, when one stood at the bottom and looked up.  It measured 18 feet from the floor to the peak of the tent, and the diameter of the floor was 15 feet.  Then twelve posts were driven into the ice of the floor at equal intervals round the wall of the tent, and the dogs were tethered to them.  From the very first day the dogs took a liking to their quarters, and they were right, as they were well off there.  I do not remember once seeing frost-rime on the coats of my dogs down in the tent.  They enjoyed every advantage there —­ air, without draughts, light, and sufficient room.  Round the tent-pole we left a pillar of snow standing in the middle of the tent to the height of a man.  It took us two days to put our eight dog tents in order.

Before the Fram sailed one of the whale-boats had been put ashore on the Barrier.  One never knew; if we found ourselves in want of a boat, it would be bad to have none, and if we did not have to use it, there was no great harm done.  It was brought up on two sledges drawn by twelve dogs, and was taken some distance into the Barrier.  The mast stood high in the air, and showed us its position clearly.

Besides all their other work, the four men had found time for shooting seals while we were away, and large quantities of meat were now stowed everywhere.  We had to lose no time in getting ready the tent in which we stored our chief supply of seal meat.  It would not have lasted long if we had left it unprotected on the ground.  To keep off the dogs, we built a wall 7 feet high of large blocks of snow.  The dogs themselves saw to its covering with ice, and for the time being all possibility of their reaching the meat was removed.

We did not let the floor grow old under our feet; it was time to be off again to the south with more food.  Our departure was fixed for February 22, and before that time we had a great deal to do.  All the provisions had first to be brought from the main depot and prepared for the journey.  Then we had to open the cases of pemmican, take out the boxes in which it was soldered, four rations in each, cut these open, and put the four rations back in the case without the tin lining.  By doing this we saved so much weight, and at the same time avoided the trouble of having this work to do later on in the cold.  The tin packing was used for the passage through the tropics, where I was afraid the pemmican might possibly melt and run into the hold of the ship.  This opening and repacking took a long time, but we got through it.  We used the pent-house as a packing-shed.