numerous details
which required personal attention. There were letters to write and
orders for Marvin to take back, together with his instructions for his
projected trip to Cape Jesup.

The next morning, Friday, March 26, I rapped the whole party up at five
o'clock, after a good sleep all round. As soon as we had eaten our usual
breakfast of pemmican, biscuit, and tea, Henson, Ootah, and Keshungwah,
with three sledges and twenty-five dogs, got away on Bartlett's trail.

Marvin, with Kudlooktoo and "Harrigan," one sledge, and seventeen dogs,
started south at half-past nine in the morning.

No shadow of apprehension for the future hung over that parting. It was
a clear, crisp morning, the sunlight glittered on the ice and snow, the
dogs were alert and active after their long sleep, the air blew cold and
fresh from the polar void, and Marvin himself, though reluctant to turn
back, was filled with exultation that he had carried the Cornell colors
to a point beyond the farthest north of Nansen and Abruzzi, and that,
with the exception of Bartlett and myself, he alone of all white men had
entered that exclusive region which stretches beyond 86 deg. 34' north
latitude.

I shall always be glad that Marvin marched with me during those last few
days. As we tramped along together we had discussed the plans for his
trip to Cape Jesup, and his line of soundings from there northward; and
as he turned back to the land his mind was glowing with hope for the
future--the future which he was destined never to know. My last words to
him were:

"Be careful of the leads, my boy!"

So we shook hands and parted in that desolate white waste, and Marvin
set his face southward toward his death, and I turned again northward
toward the Pole.

CHAPTER XXVIII

WE BREAK ALL RECORDS

By an odd coincidence, soon after Marvin left us on his fatal journey
from 86 deg. 38' back to land, the sun was obscured and a dull, lead-colored
haze spread over all the sky. This grayness, in contrast to the dead
white surface of the ice and snow and the strangely diffused quality of
the light, gave an indescribable effect. It was a shadowless light and
one in which it was impossible to see for any considerable distance.

That shadowless light is not unusual on the ice-fields of the polar sea;
but this was the first occasion on which we had encountered it since
leaving the land. One looking for the most perfect illustration of the
arctic inferno wou