it was?  A dirty old —­ pair of pants! and do you want to know where I found it?  Well, it was between the butter and the sweetmeats.  That was mixing things up with a vengeance.”  But Lindstrom must not have all the blame.  In this passage everyone was running backwards and forwards, early and late, and as a rule in the dark.  And if they knocked something down on the way, I am not quite sure that they always stopped to pick it up again.

Then he had painted the ceiling of the room white.  How cosy it looked when we put our heads in that evening!  He had seen us a long way off on the Barrier, the rascal, and now the table was laid with all manner of dainties.  But seal-steaks and the smell of coffee were what attracted us, and it was no small quantity that disappeared that evening.  Home! —­ that word has a good sound, wherever it may be, at sea, on land, or on —­ the Barrier.  How comfortable we made ourselves that night!  The first thing we did now was to dry all our reindeer-skin clothes; they were wet through.  This was not to be done in a hurry.  We had to stretch the garments that were to be dried on lines under the ceiling of the room, so that we could not dry very much at a time.

We got everything ready, and made some improvements in our outfit for a last depot journey before the winter set in.  This time the destination was 80deg.  S., with about a ton and a quarter of fresh seal meat.  How immensely important it would be on the main journey if we could give our dogs as much seal meat as they could eat at 80deg.  S.; we all saw the importance of this, and were eager to carry it out.  We set to work once more at the outfit; the last trip had taught us much that was new.  Thus Prestrud and Johansen had come to the conclusion that a double sleeping-bag was preferable to two single ones.  I will not enter upon the discussion that naturally arose on this point.  The double bag has many advantages, and so has the single bag; let it therefore remain a matter of taste.  Those two were, however, the only ones who made this alteration.  Hanssen and Wisting were busy carrying out the new idea for the tents, and it was not long before they had finished.  These tents are as much like a snow hut in form as they can be; instead of being entirely round, they have a more oblong form, but there is no flat side, and the wind has no point of attack.  Our personal outfit also underwent some improvements.

The Bay of Whales —­ the inner part of it, from Man’s Head to West Cape —­ was now entirely frozen over, but outside the sea lay immense and dark.  Our house was now completely covered with snow.  Most of this was Lindstrom’s work; the blizzard had not helped him much.  This covering with snow has a great deal to do with keeping the hut snug and warm.  Our dogs —­ 107 in number —­ mostly look like pigs getting ready for Christmas; even the famished ones that made the last trip are beginning to recover.  It is an extraordinary thing how quickly such an animal can put on flesh.