In the matter of birds, we were also pretty fortunate. For instance, Scott-Hansen and I one night shot 9 little auks, 1 kittiwake, and 1 skua, and the following day 21 more little auks and 2 black guillemots. Henriksen in one day’s shooting bagged 18 little auks and 1 black guillemot, and Nordahl, 26 little auks and 1 black guillemot; and, later on, when there had been an abundance of game for some days, we killed as many as 30 to 40 birds in the course of a few hours.
This hunting life had not only a beneficial effect upon our spirits, which occasionally were rather low, but it also gave us an appetite, which sometimes was quite ravenous. When we were weighed at the end of the month we found that, whereas some of us had previously been losing weight, we had now steadily and uniformly increased from the time when auk’s breast, roast guillemot, stewed kittiwake, skua soup, and last, but not least, ribs of bear, became the daily fare on board.
Indeed, we stood in need of all the encouragement and good living which our hunting procured us. The state of the ice was anything but cheering, and the prospect of getting out of it during the present year became less every day.
During the first days following the release of the Fram the ice was comparatively quiet; but on June 8th and 9th we had some bad pressures, especially on the latter day, when the stern of the vessel was pressed about 6 feet upward, so that the rudder-well was quite out of the water, while the bow was raised about 2 feet, with 4° list to port. On the 10th and 11th the pressure was also strong, especially during the night, from 11.30 P.M. till 3 or 4 A.M.
Finally the ice slackened so much on the morning of June 12th that there was a prospect of warping the vessel some distance ahead. As the brash was still very thick we did not think it possible to haul ourselves along without using the steam windlass, so I gave orders to start a fire under the boiler. But before steam was up the channel opened so much that we succeeded in warping the ship through the narrowest passage. When steam was up we steamed through the pool, where I had found a good berth for the ship. As the rudder was not yet shipped I had sometimes to go astern, so as to be able to turn the vessel. We remained there till June 14th, when the ice slackened a little, and we saw a channel in a S.S.W. direction, and determined to make for it. So we lighted the furnace, shipped the rudder, and made at full speed for a narrow rift, which led into the channel. Time after time we forced the vessel into the rift, but all in vain: the edges would not budge a hair’s-breadth. I let the vessel remain for some time, working at full speed endeavoring to force the rift, altering the position of the rudder occasionally. This manœuvre was partially successful, as we got the vessel into the rift as far as the fore-rigging. But that was all we could do. The opening began to close up, and we had to return and moor in the same place as before. This was all the more provoking as the whole opening was not longer than about three-fourths the ship’s length.
We remained there till the evening of the 27th, when the ice slackened so much that I decided to make a new attempt. We got up steam and commenced to force the ice at 11.30. It was slow work in the heavy ice, and at 2 o’clock we had to moor the ship, having advanced about 2 miles S.E. by S. We tried the engine this time as a compound engine, with a favorable result. It made 160 revolutions per minute; but the consumption of coal was of course correspondingly greater, almost twice as much as usual. We remained there about a week, until on July 3d the ice opened sufficiently to allow us to advance about 3 miles through a channel, which ran S.S.W. During the night between the 6th and the 7th we made another attempt to force the ice, but had only made about 1 mile when we had to moor again.
The southerly wind which predominated at that time held the ice thickly packed together, and there was no drift to speak of. On the other hand, there had been since the middle of June a good deal of current, owing to the set of the tide. We could not, however, observe that the current really flowed in any definite direction; sometimes the line would show every point in the compass during the twenty-four hours. The current was, however, often very strong, and would occasionally spin the ice-floes around in the channels in a way that made you uncomfortable to look at it. The ship, too, would often receive such violent shocks from these dancing floes and blocks of ice that loose objects tumbled down, and the whole rigging shook. The sea continued very deep. For instance, on July 6th we could not get bottom at 3000 metres (1625 fathoms); but two days later—we were then about 83° 2′ north latitude—we took soundings and reached bottom at 3400 metres (1841 fathoms).
On July 6th we succeeded in warping the ship some two or three short stretches at a time, but it was slow and hard work: the ice was bad, and the contrary wind impeded us very much. But though progress was slow, yet progress it was, and I gave orders that the ship should be hauled along as often as there was any opportunity to advance a little southward.
But although we struggled along in this manner by short distances at a time, the observation on the 13th revealed to us the fact that we had actually been drifting a considerable way backward, having returned to 83° 12′ north latitude. It might seem ridiculous, under such circumstances, to continue pushing forward; but, gloomy as the prospects were, we tried to keep up our hopes, and were ready to utilize the very first chance which should present itself.
Late in the evening of July 17th the ice began to slacken so much that we decided to get up steam. True, it closed up again at once, but nevertheless we kept up steam. Nor were we disappointed, for at 1 o’clock in the morning the water opened so much that we were able to steam ahead, and we made 3 miles in a southerly direction. Later in the morning we were stopped by an immense floe of ice, extending many miles; and we had to make fast. The whole day following we remained there. About midnight the ice slackened a good deal, but the fog was so dense that we could see nothing. At last, on the 19th, we made what we considered excellent headway. Starting when the fog lifted a little in the forenoon, we made about 10 miles from 12.30 P.M. till 8 P.M. This stroke of good luck made our spirits revive wonderfully, and they rose still more the following day when, notwithstanding the fog and though we had to stop three times, we advanced from 83° 14′ in the morning to 82° 52′ at noon and 82° 39′ midnight. From the 20th to the 27th we continued to make good progress. By midnight on the last-named day we had reached 81° 32′ north latitude.