at all costs, as the thin provision cases would not stand many bumps on the ice; besides which, it was such hard work righting the sledges again that for this reason alone the drivers exercised the greatest care.  The sledges were put to a severe test that day, with the many great and hard irregularities we encountered on the glacier; it is a wonder they survived it, and is a good testimonial for Bjaaland’s work.

The glacier that day presented the worst confusion we had yet had to deal with.  Hassel and I went in front, as usual, with the rope on.  Up to the spot Hanssen and I had reached the evening before our progress was comparatively easy; one gets on so much quicker when one knows that the way is practicable.  After this point it became worse; indeed, it was often so bad that we had to stop for a long time and try in various directions, before finding a way.  More than once the axe had to be used to hack away obstructions.  At one time things looked really serious; chasm after chasm, hummock after hummock, so high and steep that they were like mountains.  Here we went out and explored in every direction to find a passage; at last we found one, if, indeed, it deserved the name of a passage.  It was a bridge so narrow that it scarcely allowed room for the width of the sledge; a fearful abyss on each side.  The crossing of this place reminded me of the tight-rope walker going over Niagara.  It was a good thing none of us was subject to giddiness, and that the dogs did not know exactly what the result of a false step would be.

On the other side of this bridge we began to go downhill, and our course now lay in a long valley between lofty undulations on each side.  It tried our patience severely to advance here, as the line of the hollow was fairly long and ran due west.  We tried several times to lay our course towards the south and clamber up the side of the undulation, but these efforts did not pay us.  We could always get up on to the ridge, but we could not come down again on the other side; there was nothing to be done but to follow the natural course of the valley until it took us into the tract lying to the south.  It was especially the drivers whose patience was sorely tried, and I could see them now and then take a turn up to the top of the ridge, not satisfied with the exploration Hassel and I had made.  But the result was always the same; they had to submit to Nature’s caprices and follow in our tracks.

Our course along this natural line was not entirely free from obstruction; crevasses of various dimensions constantly crossed our path.  The ridge or undulation, at the top of which we at last arrived, had quite an imposing effect.  It terminated on the east in a steep drop to the underlying surface, and attained at this point a height of over 100 feet.  On the west it sloped gradually into the lower ground and allowed us to advance that way.  In order to have a better view of the surroundings we ascended the eastern and highest part of the ridge, and from here we at once had a confirmation of our supposition of the day before.  The ridge we had then seen, behind which we hoped to find better conditions, could now be seen a good way ahead.  And what we then saw made our hearts beat fast with joy.  Could that great white, unbroken plain over there be real, or was it only an illusion?  Time would show.