Under these circumstances, I gave up the idea of sending the two men in for the Cape Alexandra cache.
We will stick to the outer edge of the foot-ice. If we can make Columbia, and get the meat there, well and good; if not, we will keep right on to Hecla and eat dog till we get there.
Two large streams negotiated to-day. One by fording, sweeping sledges down and wetting almost everything on them, the other by bridging a fortunate cañon.
My clothes are now literally rotting from the constant wet. I have got used to the disagreeableness of the wet, but not yet to the stench of the last few days, especially when in camp, and turned in.
A seal was seen out on the ice, but he went into the water before Egingwah could get near him.
A nearly complete specimen of the same fish as I found beyond Cape Alfred Ernest was also picked up to-day, but the dogs got it all except the head.
The whole width of this big glacier from Cape Alexandra west, is composed of heavy hummocky ice, which, when broken off, will form “paleocrystic” floes.
“Nungwoodie,” the faithful gray dog, played out, and was killed here. Very sorry to have him go.
Two more days, or rather a continuous performance of this infernal weather, then one decent night, and after a long forced march which killed one dog, used up another and left us practically played out, we reached the low point of Columbia, which forms Cape Aldrich, and set up the tent on dry gravel, the first time in twelve days that it had been set up in anything except slush and water.
Looking out over the ice from the tent, I saw that where we came in, unpleasant as was the going, was the only practicable place. From where we came in, clear round the point, was a wide, deep lake.