Nansen and Sverdrup led the way with the large sleigh, while the others, each dragging a smaller one, followed in their wake. Thus these six men, confident of solving the problem before them, with the firm earth beneath their feet, commenced the ascent of the mountain-slope which Nansen christened “Nordenskjöld’s Nunatak.”[2]
Their work had now begun in real earnest—a work so severe and arduous that it would require all the strength and powers of endurance they possessed to accomplish it. The ice was full of fissures, and these had either to be circumvented or crossed, a very difficult matter with heavily laden sleighs. A covering of ice often lay over these fissures, so that great caution was required. Hence their progress was often very slow, each man being roped to his fellow; so that if one of them should happen to disappear into one of these fathomless abysses, his companion could haul him up. Such an occurrence happened more than once; for Nansen as well as the others would every now and then fall plump in up to the arms, dangling with his legs over empty space. But it always turned out well; for powerful hands took hold of the rope, and the practised gymnasts knew how to extricate themselves.
At first the ascent was very hard work, and it will readily be understood that the six tired men were not sorry on the first night of their journey to crawl into their sleeping-bags, after first refreshing the inner man with cup after cup of hot tea.
Yet, notwithstanding all the fatigue they had undergone, there was so much strength left in them that Dietrichson volunteered to go back and fetch a piece of Gruyère cheese they had left behind when halting for their midday meal. “It would be a nice little morning walk,” he said, “before turning in!” And he actually went—all for the sake of a precious bit of cheese!
Next day there was a pouring rain that wet them through. The work of hauling the sleighs, however, kept them warm. But later in the evening, it came down in such torrents that Nansen deemed it advisable to pitch the tent, and here they remained, weather-bound, for three whole days. And long days they were! But our travellers followed the example of bruin in winter; that is, they lay under shelter the greater part of the time, Nansen taking care that they should also imitate bruin in another respect,—who sleeps sucking his paw,—by giving them rations once a day only. “He who does no work shall have little food,” was his motto.
On the forenoon of the twentieth, however, the weather improved; and our travellers again set out on their journey, having first indulged in a good warm meal by way of recompense for their three days’ fasting. The ice at first was very difficult, so much so that they had to retrace their steps, and, sitting on their sleighs, slide down the mountain slope. But the going improved, as also did the weather. “If it would only freeze a little,” sighed Nansen. But he was to get enough of frost before long.
On they tramped, under a broiling sun, over the slushy snow. As there was no drinking-water to be had, they filled their flasks with snow, carrying them in their breast-pockets for the heat of their bodies to melt it.
On Aug. 22 there was a night frost; the snow was hard and in good condition, but the surface so rough and full of lumps and frozen waves of slush, that the ropes with which they dragged the sleighs cut and chafed their shoulders. “It was just as if our shoulders were being burnt,” Balto said.
They now travelled mostly by night, for it was better going then, and there was no sun to broil them; while the aurora borealis, bathing as it were the whole of the frozen plain in a flood of silvery light, inspired them with fresh courage. The surface of the ice over which they travelled was as smooth and even as a lake newly frozen over. Even Balto on such occasions would indulge in a few oaths, a thing he never allowed himself except when he felt “master of the situation.” He was a Finn, you see, and perhaps had no other way of giving expression to his feelings!
As they got into higher altitudes the cold at night became more intense. Occasionally they were overtaken by a snowstorm, when they had to encamp in order to avoid being frozen to death; while at times, again, the going would become so heavy in the fine drifting snow that they had to drag their sleighs one by one, three or four men at a time to each sleigh, an operation involving such tremendous exertion that Kristiansen, a man of few words, on one such occasion said to Nansen, “What fools people must be to let themselves in for work like this!”