ce had broken I might have held the sled from sinking
until one of the others came to me, or I might not; the boys would
probably have gone in too. It was a most risky spot and the sort of
chance no one would think of taking under ordinary circumstances. As it
was, the ice broke under Arthur's feet, and only by throwing his weight
on the sled did he save himself a ducking. But we got the load safely
across.

A good run of perhaps a mile, and then we had to go back at least half a
mile, for the ice played out altogether on our side of the river as we
reached the Batzakaket, and there was open water in the middle. To reach
the shore ice that was continuous on the other side, we had to "double"
the open water. With such varying fortune the day passed, and we camped
on the level ice of a little creek tributary to the right bank, having
made perhaps another nineteen miles.

When I awoke in the morning my heart sank at the tiny, creeping patter
of fine snow on the silk tent. Snow was one thing I greatly dreaded, for
there was not a pair of snow-shoes amongst us! A little snow would not
do much harm, but if once snow began to fall we might have a foot or two
before it ceased, and then we should be in bad case. It stopped before
noon, but the half-inch that fell made the sled drag much heavier. The
actual force to be exerted was not the most laborious feature of pulling
that sled; it was the jerk, jerk, jerk on the shoulders. A dog's four
legs give him much smoother traction than a man's two legs give, just as
a four-cylinder engine will turn a propeller with much less vibration
than a two-cylinder engine. Every step forward gave an impulse that
spent itself before the next impulse was given, and the result was that
the shoulders grew sore.

We came that morning to the longest and roughest ice-jam we had so far
encountered. It was as though a thousand bulls had been turned loose in
a mammoth plate-glass warehouse. Jagged slabs of ice upended everywhere
in the most riotous confusion, and it was impossible to pick any way
amongst them, so a man had to go ahead and hew a path. It was while thus
engaged that the doctor fell and injured his knee so severely on a sharp
ice point that he hobbled in pain the rest of the trip. This was a very
serious matter to us, for, though he insisted on still taking his trick
at the traces, his effectiveness as a motive power was much diminished;
and we had no sooner thus hewed and smashed our way