e nearly all Alaskan problems, essentially one of transportation.
But the Northeast Ridge, in its present condition, adds all the spice of
sensation and danger that any man could desire.

FOOTNOTE:

[3] See illustration facing p. 40.

CHAPTER IV

THE GRAND BASIN

The reader will perhaps be able to sympathize with the feeling of
elation and confidence which came to us when we had surmounted the
difficulties of the ridge and had arrived at the entrance to the Grand
Basin. We realized that the greater and more arduous part of our task
was done and that the way now lay open before us. For so long a time
this point had been the actual goal of our efforts, for so long a time
we had gazed upward at it with hope deferred, that its final attainment
was accompanied with no small sense of triumph and gratification and
with a great accession of faith that we should reach the top of the
mountain.

[Sidenote: Heat and Cold]

The ice of the glacier that fills the basin was hundreds of feet beneath
us at the pass, but it rises so rapidly that by a short traverse under
the cliffs of the ridge we were able to reach its surface and select a
camping site thereon at about sixteen thousand feet. It was bitterly
cold, with a keen wind that descended in gusts from the heights, and the
slow movement of step-cutting gave the man in the rear no opportunity of
warming up. Toes and fingers grew numb despite multiple socks within
mammoth moccasins and thick gloves within fur mittens.

From this time, during our stay in the Grand Basin and until we had left
it and descended again, the weather progressively cleared and brightened
until all clouds were dispersed. From time to time there were fresh
descents of vapor, and even short snow-storms, but there was no general
enveloping of the mountain again. Cold it was, at times even in the
sunshine, with "a nipping and an eager air," but when the wind ceased it
would grow intensely hot. On the 4th June, at 3 P. M., the thermometer
in the full sunshine rose to 50 deg. F.--the highest temperature recorded
on the whole excursion--and the fatigue of packing in that thin atmosphere
with the sun's rays reflected from ice and snow everywhere was most
exhausting. We were burned as brown as Indians; lips and noses split and
peeled in spite of continual applications of lanoline, but, thanks to
those most beneficent amber snow-glasses, no one of the party had the
slightest trouble with his eyes. At n