ce outside, quite close; but yet
there is a sufficient fairway to let us push on eastward."

The following day we got into good, open water, but shallow--never
more than 6 to 7 fathoms. We heard the roaring of waves to the east,
so there must certainly be open water in that direction, which indeed
we had expected. It was plain that the Lena, with its masses of warm
water, was beginning to assert its influence. The sea here was browner,
and showed signs of some mixture of muddy river-water. It was also
much less salt.

"It would be foolish," I write in my diary for this day (September
15th), "to go in to the Olenek, now that we are so late. Even if there
were no danger from shoals, it would cost us too much time--probably a
year. Besides, it is by no means sure that the Fram can get in there at
all; it would be a very tiresome business if she went aground in these
waters. No doubt we should be very much the better of a few more dogs,
but to lose a year is too much; we shall rather head straight east
for the New Siberian Islands, now that there is a good opportunity,
and really bright prospects.

"The ice here puzzles me a good deal. How in the world is it not
swept northward by the current, which, according to my calculations,
ought to set north from this coast, and which indeed we ourselves
have felt. And it is such hard, thick ice--has the appearance of
being several years old. Does it come from the eastward, or does
it lie and grind round here in the sea between the 'north-going'
current of the Lena and the Taimur Peninsula? I cannot tell yet,
but anyhow it is different from the thin, one-year-old ice we have
seen until now in the Kara Sea and west of Cape Chelyuskin.

"Saturday, September 16th. We are keeping a northwesterly course (by
compass) through open water, and have got pretty well north, but see
no ice, and the air is dark to the northward. Mild weather, and water
comparatively warm, as high as 35 deg. Fahr. We have the current against
us, and are always considerably west of our reckoning. Several flocks
of eider-duck were seen in the course of the day. We ought to have
land to the north of us; can it be that which is keeping back the ice?"

Next day we met ice, and had to hold a little to the south to keep
clear of it; and I began to fear that we should not be able to get
as far as I had hoped. But in my notes for the following day (Monday,
September 18th) I read: "A splendid day. Shaped our course nort