le and creaking of the sledges over the snow.

It is often asked how we keep warm when riding on the sledges. We do not
ride, save in rare instances. We walk, and when the going is hard we
have to help the dogs by lifting the sledges over rough places.

The first party returned the same day with the empty sledges, and the
next day two Eskimo hunting parties came in with three deer, six hares,
and two eider ducks. Neither party had seen any tracks of musk-oxen. On
the 18th, the second sledge party was sent out to carry fifty-six cases
of crew pemmican to Cape Richardson, where they were to camp, bring up
the biscuit from Cape Belknap to Cape Richardson the following day, and
then return to the ship. That gave them one night in the field.

A man's first night in a canvas tent in the Arctic is likely to be
rather wakeful. The ice makes mysterious noises; the dogs bark and fight
outside the tent where they are tethered; and as three Eskimos and one
white man usually occupy a small tent, and the oil-stove is left burning
all night, the air, notwithstanding the cold, is not over-pure; and
sometimes the Eskimos begin chanting to the spirits of their ancestors
in the middle of the night, which is, to say the least, trying.
Sometimes, too, the new man's nerves are tried by hearing wolves howl in
the distance.

The tents are specially made. They are of light-weight canvas, and the
floor of the tent is sewed directly into it. The fly is sewed up, a
circular opening cut in it, just large enough to admit a man, and that
opening fitted with a circular flap which is closed by a draw-string,
making the tent absolutely snow-proof. An ordinary tent, when the snow
is flying, would be filled in no time.

The tent is pyramidal, with one pole in the center, and the edges are
usually held down by the sledge runners or by snowshoes used as tent
pegs. The men sleep on the floor in their clothes, with a musk-ox skin
under, and a light deerskin over them. I have not used sleeping bags
since my arctic trip of 1891-92.

The "kitchen box" for our sledge journeys is simply a wooden box
containing two double-burner oil-stoves, with four-inch wicks. The two
cooking pots are the bottoms of five-gallon coal-oil tins, fitted with
covers. When packed they are turned bottom side up over each stove, and
the hinged cover of the wooden box is closed. On reaching camp, whether
tent or snow igloo, the kitchen box is set down inside, the top of the
box is t