a force which
I had never witnessed before, though I have crossed the Atlantic more
than twenty times in winter and met with furious gales.

[Illustration: "We remained seated on the ground, back to back."]

When I thought that it was impossible for the wind to blow stronger, the
next squall proved that it could. Then we fell in with a number of men
of the party. They had stopped; they did not dare to go further,
travelling had become impossible; before we knew it we might fall over a
precipice, or go in the wrong direction. I managed to look at my
thermometer. It was 17 degrees below zero. I wished it had been forty or
forty-five, for instead of a windstorm we should then have had glorious
still weather.

The wind had risen to such a pitch that no snow was left on the ground,
though in many places it must have been twenty or thirty feet deep or
more. It was all flying in the air, and though it was noon it was quite
dark. We remained seated on the ground, back to back, in order to
support each other, with our heads bent, to prevent as far as possible
the snow getting under our masks. It was a weird sight, as once in a
while I could see dimly through the flying snow our bent, immovable
bodies, with heads down. Not a man said a word; it seemed as if we were
frozen to death.

The snow was carried hither and thither, and all at once in a lull of a
few seconds fell, forming hillocks, which were in an instant destroyed
and sent flying in the air. One of these hillocks settled dangerously
near us and scared us.

Then one of the men suggested that we had better divide into two
parties, so that in case one should be buried in the snow, the other
party could help to extricate those who were buried. This suggestion was
accepted at once. As we got up several of the men were taken off their
feet, and rolled over against some sleighs, which stopped them. I was
raised bodily and thrown on the ground, and carried away; but some of
the men came to my rescue and caught me. Finally we succeeded in making
two parties; we were about fifty yards from each other and ready to help
one another in case of emergency.

The wind became so terrific that we had to crouch against the rocks. I
thought we must be in the heart of "The Land of the Wind," and that this
was the worst country I had ever come to. I almost believed that the
wind had obtained the mastery over the world, and chaos was coming
again. But after a few hours these north-west