A Diary and Journal from the Second Grinnell Expedition

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McGeary, my relief, calls me. He has foraged out some raw cabbage and spiced it up with curry powder, our only remaining pepper. This, with a piece of corn bread, no bad article either, he calls me to share with him. True to my old times habitudes I hasten to the cabbage. Cold roast beef Worcester sauce, a head of endive, and a bottle, not one drop less, of [Presi?] Pans ale. (I never drink any other). McGeary "bring on de beans."!

Thurs. Jan. 18. 12 [Mid?]

Wind howling on deck, a noq. gale a warm S.Easter directly from the land. The mean temperature of this wind is -20°. Warm as this may seem our Experience has taught us to prepare -40° with a calm to -10° with a face opposing gale. Judging by what little of weather wisdom I have acquired I should if we only had daylight start as soon as the present wind subsided, believing that I would have a three days interim between a renewal of atmospheric disturbance and the coming moon. It is however too dark to encounter the squeezed ice and I must wait.

[*Describe the survey &c. all after date of return on p. 280.*] My [plan] mode of travel I said yesterday, was peculiar. I will imagine myself explaining it to the tea table. [Bessie and Sallie Butler]] my outfit and intentions.

Route Say the Route is from Brig Advance Rennsselaer Harbour to Esquimaux Huts of Leiper Bay.

1. From Brig to Ten mile Ravine 10. m.

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2. From Ten mile Ravine to Basalt Camp 6. m

3. From B. Camp to Helen River 10. (bottom of Bedevilled Reach)

4. Helen River to Devil's Jaws 9 (off Godsend Id inshore side)

5. Godsend Id to Anaotok. 4

Total travel 39

Anaotok to First Hummock Pass]3

Hummack Pass to Old ice South 7. Old ice & young to Second Pass 22 Across Second H. Pass to S. end of Littleton Id 8 S. End of Littleton to Point Salvation 2 Point Salvation to Esquimaux Huts 12 54

Total in miles 83 Temp = about -45° Range of same -40 to -60°

Resources. Five nearly starved dogs. Hans and Dr Kane. a light sledge and outfit.

Outfit

To encounter broken ice in the midst of darkness and at a temperature destructive to life, every thing depends upon your sledge. Should it break down, you might as well break your own leg, there is no hope for you. Our sledge is made of well tried oak, dove tailed into a runner shod with iron. No iron except [save] the screws and [riots?] which confine the sledge to its runners is used besides [throughout the structure]. In [such] this intense cold, iron snaps like glass and no immoveable or rigidly fastened woodwork would stand for a moment the fierce concussions of an arctic drive. Every thing is put together with lashings of seal skin, [tied securely in its place] and the whole fabric - seemingly a