[3] We had now, as the spring advanced, a good opportunity of seeing how the little auk in great flocks and the black guillemots in smaller numbers, invariably set forth from land at certain times of the day towards the open sea, and then at other times returned in unbroken lines up the ice-bound fjords to their nest-rocks again.
Chapter IX
The Journey Southward
At last, on Tuesday, May 19th, we were ready for the start. Our sledges stood loaded and lashed. The last thing we did was to photograph our hut, both outside and inside, and to leave in it a short report of our journey. It ran thus:
“Tuesday, May 19, 1896. We were frozen in north of Kotelnoi at about 78° 43′ north latitude, September 22, 1893. Drifted northwestward during the following year, as we had expected to do. Johansen and I left the Fram, March 14, 1895, at about 84° 4′ north latitude and 103° east longitude,[1] to push on northward. The command of the remainder of the expedition was transferred to Sverdrup. Found no land northward. On April 6, 1895, we had to turn back at 86° 14′ north latitude and about 95° east longitude, the ice having become impassable. Shaped our course for Cape Fligely; but our watches having stopped, we did not know our longitude with certainty, and arrived on August 6, 1895, at four glacier-covered islands to the north of this line of islands, at about 81° 30′ north latitude, and about 7° E. of this place. Reached this place August 26, 1895, and thought it safest to winter here. Lived on bear’s flesh. Are starting to-day southwestward along the land, intending to cross over to Spitzbergen at the nearest point. We conjecture that we are on Gillies Land.
“Fridtjof Nansen.”
This earliest report of our journey was deposited in a brass tube which had formed the cylinder of the airpump of our “Primus.” The tube was closed with a plug of wood and hung by a wire to the roof-tree of the hut.
At length, on Tuesday, the 19th of May, we were ready, and at 7 P.M. left our winter lair and began our journey south. After having had so little exercise all the winter, we were not much disposed for walking, and thought our sledges with the loaded kayaks heavy to pull along. In order not to do too much at first, but make our joints supple before we began to exert ourselves seriously, we walked for only a few hours the first day, and then, well satisfied, pitched our camp. There was such a wonderfully happy feeling in knowing that we were, at last, on the move, and that we were actually going homeward.
The following day (Wednesday, May 20th) we also did only a short day’s march. We were making for the promontory to the southwest of us that we had been looking at all the winter. Judging from the sky, it was on the farther side of this headland that we should find open water. We were very eager to see how the land lay ahead of this point. If we were north of Cape Lofley, the land must begin to trend to the southeast. If, on the other hand, the trend of the coast was to the southwest, then this must be a new land farther west, and near Gillies Land.