“Yes,” was the curt answer, “it’s quite true! Ravna is a silly old fool!”
One day, however, shortly afterward, while they were at dinner, they heard the twittering of a bird close by. It was a snow-bunting, bringing them a greeting from the west coast, and their hearts grew warm within them at the welcome sound.
On the next day, with sails set, they proceeded onward down the sloping ground, but with only partial success. Nansen was standing behind the large sleigh to steady it, while Sverdrup steered from the front. Merrily flew the bark; but, unfortunately, Nansen stumbled and fell, and had hard work to regain his legs, and harder work still to gather up sundry articles that had fallen off the sleigh, such as boxes of pemmican, fur jackets, and ice-axes. Meanwhile Sverdrup and the ship had almost disappeared from view, and all that Nansen could see of it was a dark, square speck, far ahead across the ice. Sverdrup had been sitting all the while in front, thinking what an admirable passage they were making, and was not a little astonished, on looking behind, to find that he was the only passenger on board. Matters, however, went on better after this; and in the afternoon, as they were sailing their best and fastest, the joyful cry of “Land ahead!” rang through the air. The west coast was in sight! After several days’ hard work across fissures and over uneven ice, the coast itself was finally reached. But Godthaab was a long, long way off still, and to reach it by land was sheer impossibility.
The joy of our travellers on once more feeling firm ground beneath their feet, and of getting real water to drink, was indescribable. They swallowed quart after quart, till they could drink no more. The Lapps, as usual took themselves off to the fjeld to testify their joy.
That evening was the most delightful one they had experienced for weeks, one never to be forgotten in after years, when, with their tent pitched, and a blazing fire of wood, they sat beside it, Sverdrup smoking a pipe of moss in lieu of tobacco, and Nansen lying on his back on the grass, which shed a strange and delightful perfume all around.
But how was Godthaab to be reached? By land it was impossible! Therefore the journey must be made by sea! But there was no boat! A boat, then, must be built. And Sverdrup and Nansen were the men to solve the problem. They set to work, and by evening the boat was finished. Its dimensions were eight feet five inches in length, four feet eight inches in breadth, and it was made of willows and sail-cloth. The oars were of bamboo and willow branches, across the blades of which canvas was stretched. The thwarts were made from bamboo, and the foot of one of their scientific instruments which, by the way, chafed them terribly, and were very uncomfortable seats.
On the way to Godthaab.
All preparations being now made, Nansen and Sverdrup set off on their adventurous journey. The first day it was terribly hard work, for the water was too shallow to admit of rowing. On the second day, however, they put out to sea. Here they had at times to encounter severe weather, fearing every moment lest their frail bark should be swamped or capsized. At night they would sleep on the naked shore beneath the open sky. From morning till night struggling away with their oars, living on hot soup and the sea-birds they shot, which were ravenously devoured without much labor being devoted to cooking the same. Finally they reached their destination, meeting with a hearty welcome, accompanied by a salute from cannon fired off in their honor, when once it was ascertained who the new arrivals were.
Nansen’s first inquiry was about a ship for Denmark, and he learned, to his great disappointment, that the last vessel for the season had sailed from Godthaab two months before, and that the nearest ship, the Fox, was lying at Ivitgut, three hundred miles off.