On the 19th of March, fair weather came out of the north, and not only cheered the hearts of the whole colony at the station, but fired the desire of Lieutenant Lockwood for the new campaign, which he had long been contemplating. After a consultation with Lieutenant Greely, he concluded to start on the following day, or soon after. As usual, some cold water was thrown upon his plans, one of the critics declaring that they had experienced enough of that kind of business; and another, that they had better be thinking of their coming fate. But Lockwood’s reasoning was as follows: “Before I go home, I must make another ‘strike’ on the north Greenland coast. If the conditions of the ice are no worse, I ought to be able to discover the northeast extremity of Greenland, and add several miles to my latitude, although Lieutenant Greely thinks that my present ‘farthest’ will not again be reached in our day. I say nothing about all this, however. Act first and talk afterward has always been my way.”
Lockwood was both hopeful and determined, and on the 23d he received his final orders to the effect, that, should he not be able to reach a higher latitude 230 than he did before without undue danger, or should he or any of his men break down or become dangerously ill, he was to return forthwith. To this he replied that he knew not what might happen, but he intended, if possible, to reach the eighty-fourth parallel. In anticipation of his own birthday, and to honor the explorers with a good “send-off,” Lieutenant Greely gave a dinner on the 26th, and, thus fortified, they were prepared to move on the following day, rejoicing.
Lockwood had two fine teams of ten dogs each assigned for his use, and, as before, the faithful Brainard and Esquimaux Frederick were to accompany him. Everything passed off quietly, without the excitement or enthusiasm of the previous spring. They left the station at 8.30 A. M., the advance sledge bearing the silk flag of Mrs. Greely, with Brainard and Frederick the Esquimaux; the supporting sledge with Jewell, Ellis, and Esquimaux Jans; and then the pup-team and sledge driven by Snyder, and carrying Greely and Lockwood. On reaching Watercourse Bay, whence they were to take back a load of coal, Lieutenant Greely and team left them, after bidding God-speed, and telling them to be sure and bring back the north end of Greenland! Reaching Depot A in two and a quarter hours, they took on two small seals left there, and passing Depot B, where they obtained more provisions, they reached Cape Beechy at 4 P. M.—the dogs quite fresh, but the men much wearied.
When they resumed their journey, it was snowing and the Greenland shore invisible. They took a direct 231 course by compass for Cape Sumner over rubble-ice until they reached the first floe, on whose hard, undulating surface they made rapid progress until they came to rubble-ice again. Brainard, with axe in hand, went ahead, clearing the way over impassable places, until the high cliff of Polaris Promontory came in sight. Finally, both Jewell and Ellis suffering from pain, when three miles from Cape Sumner they stopped for the night, after making twenty miles, and all went into bags.
Moving early next morning with considerable wind, they got into bad ice with cracks, down which some of the dogs fell and had to be drawn up; but finally, finding a better route, reached the Polaris Boat Camp, where, leaving some meat for the dogs when returning, they continued on toward Gap Valley, generally over rolling floes, and through rubble, requiring a good deal of cutting, tugging, and pushing.
When three miles out they went into camp again, leaving Ellis to prepare supper for all, while the others, with both sledges, returned to the Boat Camp.
Leaving Brainard to get ready the alcohol to be taken from the whale-boat, they kept on along shore to the foot of the cliffs and the cache. Here they found the snow-slopes much worse than on their last visit, but, the sledges being empty, they could have gone along over anything except a stone wall, and even that would have had to be very high to stop them. Fox-tracks were seen near the cache, but they found it intact. The ice they had piled about it was almost 232 covered by the drifting snow. The contents of the cache, about one thousand pounds in all, were put on the two sledges, and soon after they went down a snow-bank so steep and hard that the sledges took entire command, though all hands tried to hold them back; but the dogs keeping out of the way, no harm was done. This was at Cape Sumner, whence they returned to the Boat Camp. Here, taking on the things prepared by Brainard, they returned to the tents. After supper some hours were spent in getting ready the rations for from twenty to forty-eight days. Jewell and Ellis were both complaining; otherwise, every thing looked very promising.
On the morning of the 30th, it was clear overhead but cloudy around the horizon, and a slight snow was falling. The loads were about eleven hundred pounds to each team, but the dogs did admirably, and good speed was made, the ice being covered with a very light depth of snow. At the mouth of the gorge by which they were to ascend and cross the Brevoort Peninsula, they reduced the load on each sledge and started up this narrow, rocky, winding ca?on. The snow was hard and they were getting along well, when right before them appeared a wall of snow, so steep and hard that Lockwood had to use his big knife, to ascend. It was about thirty feet high. He went alone to view the situation. A few yards beyond was a kind of ice tunnel whose roof was about three feet high. Then came another high, steep snow-drift with a snow-cavern alongside, probably fifty yards in length; and also a few feet farther 233 was found a deep pit formed by the snow. Climbing around this and proceeding half a mile, he found that the gorge made a bend to the east and became still more narrow and rocky; but a side ravine offered a chance to get out of this big gutter, up a long, steep slope of hard snow, three or four times the height of the preceding drifts; and then Lockwood found himself on the table-land overlooking Newman Bay.
The sledges with great difficulty gained this comparatively level divide. The landmarks not being altogether familiar to Lockwood, he took a long walk after supper to a distant ridge, where, seeing the sea-coast, his way became perfectly clear. It was a lonely and dismal walk, and the ridge seemed to get farther away as he approached it. After more than two hours’ absence he returned to the tents, crawled in alongside of Sergeant Brainard, and was quickly lulled to sleep notwithstanding the snoring of Frederick. The horrid sound issuing from his bag was as loud as a brass band at a circus.
The process of getting breakfast was to be preferred to that of getting supper. When a man went into camp, after a toilsome day of travel, and had helped to pitch tent and unload the sledge, it was hard, while covered with frost, with cold and perhaps wet feet, to chop ice and meat, and handle cold metal.
After an uncomfortable night, with the temperature down to -45°, they started again. Proceeding several miles, they reached a narrow, winding ravine, and finally a gorge, which they followed until they 234 came to the head of the wide Gap Valley, and thence to the sea-coast. Turning east, they continued on a few hundred yards, and were then stopped by the ice-wall, which crowded so closely to the shore that the sledges could not be hauled through. Lockwood and Frederick pitched the tent, while Brainard went ahead with the axe, and, after much hard work, made a passage about one eighth of a mile long through this place. They managed to worry through with half the load by three o’clock, and, leaving Brainard to get supper, Lockwood and Frederick went on with half the load for about one and a half miles. The route beyond the bad place was excellent. Dropping the load, they returned to the tent by four o’clock. Jewell came along later, he and Ellis complaining again of their difficulty in keeping up with the sledge when it went faster than a slow walk.
While approaching the cairn at Repulse Harbor, on the 1st of April, Brainard’s sharp eyes discovered the site of the English depot of rations, which contained Lieutenant Beaumont’s sextant, an English flag, a cooking-lamp, old clothes, and some foot-gear. The road before them was excellent, and they made good time, soon passing the route of the preceding year, which reached the coast just east of Repulse Harbor.
On coming near Drift Point, they were better able to see the northern expanse outside the ice-wall which lined the coast and had interrupted the view. Lockwood saw a good deal of young ice interspersed with holes, and leads of open water. The main pack beyond 235 seemed permeated by leads of what had been quite recently open water. Dark, misty “water-clouds” were seen everywhere northward. The young ice extended along shore in both directions as far as they could see, and out from shore a hundred yards or more. Beyond it was the polar pack, broken into small floes and rubble-ice, which had a glistening green appearance, as though recently pushed up by the grinding of the fields about it; all this was very surprising.
They made their way over the snow-slopes of Drift Point and beyond until the near approach of the cliffs on one side and the ice-wall on the other brought them to a halt eighty miles from Fort Conger. Here they encamped with everything, having come thus far in six days.
The ice-wall along here was from forty to fifty feet high. Outside, there was a good deal of ice lately formed, with smooth floes. They passed on near the foot of the bluffs, to see if there was any way of getting along the cliffs, making their way between the ice-wall and the foot of the steep slopes of the bluffs with great effort. The débris of stone, etc., from the cliffs above made the route almost impracticable for a sledge. Before reaching Black Horn Cliffs, they were obliged to find a route along the top of the ice-wall, and thus got a short distance along the bottom of these vertical cliffs. But now, from a fissure in the cliffs above, came a steep drift of very hard snow, slanting down to the water at its foot. To scale the cliffs by means of this drift was dangerous, 236 as a slip would inevitably have taken one directly into the water.
By cutting steps in the snow they gained a considerable elevation, but, on looking round a point of rocks, the height beyond was so much greater and worse than they expected, that they could not proceed. All along shore was the crack of open water about a yard wide, with young ice beyond, through which a stone or fragment of ice might be thrown. Dense water-clouds appeared in many directions. They returned to camp, and, after enjoying some tea, Lockwood gave Jewell the tidal rod to make observations, while with Brainard he started out again, this time to the south and up a stream-bed, at whose mouth they were encamped, hoping to find a route back of the cliffs overland. They soon found themselves in a ravine with high, rocky sides, and encountered a steep snow-drift. Beyond was a small hole in the snow, which seemed to be a cavern or grotto formed of snow and ice, and probably running down to the bed of the stream—if that may be called a stream which has no water. Beyond this were exposed rocks under foot, and they saw ptarmigan-tracks, where the birds had used their wings in getting down a snow-drift. Finally, they came to a branch ravine from the southeast, the main stream leading off toward the south. They turned up the branch, and kept on for a while, when the high rocky sides seemed to come to a formation of ice like a glacier, a hundred feet high, at least, and very steep. The crest was perpendicular. The route thus far was difficult yet 237 practicable, but it was clearly impossible for a dog-team to haul an empty sledge up this place, and yet it was the only place where there was anything else than an inclined plane of rocks. The glacier was covered with snow, but in many places the ice could be seen cropping out, the snow being only a thin covering. Some ice-grottoes were also seen. They clambered up the rocks to the left, and found themselves on a stony plateau. Off to the east was an elevated ridge or knoll, toward which they traveled about a mile and a half. On gaining it, the barometer showed an elevation of thirteen hundred feet. Toward the south was a chain of mountains running east and west, through the western extremity of which the main stream-bed they had ascended seemed to break, about six miles from the sea. The branch appeared to end at the glacier; but to the east of it the land sloped north and south, and formed a surface-drain which, running east, soon narrowed into a gorge, and, bending to the north, reached the sea just west of Rest Gorge, as well as they could make out. At the bend was a large formation of ice or snow.
They returned to camp at 3 P. M., and found every one there walking vigorously up and down to keep warm, or, rather, to keep from freezing, the thermometer marking -48°. Jewell left his beat every few minutes to note the height of the water on the tide-rod. There was now nothing else to do except to get into the sleeping-bags, and this in cold weather always involves a change of foot-gear. At six o’clock Brainard had prepared supper, and shortly 238 after, the advance sledge-party was trying to sleep. Jewell kept on taking observations until after eleven, when he caught the high tide. It was a severe ordeal, but he preferred to do it, without assistance, as it was much better for the record.
Brainard complained of want of sleep, and Lockwood’s rest was much the same as usual—an uneasy, oppressed feeling of being half asleep and half awake; every few hours getting broad awake, and wondering if it were time to rise, or how much colder his feet would have to get before freezing. Having decided to examine the main ravine running south, Lockwood started from camp before eight, with Brainard, Frederick, and Ellis. On reaching the branch, he and Ellis continued south, and the other two went up the branch. Continuing along between the high, rocky sides of the ravine, with abundance of hard snow under foot, but some bad snow-drifts, they found a very good sledge-route. After a while, they came to a huge formation of snow, filling the whole breadth of the ravine, and sloping up—in one place by a very easy ascent—to the west bank. Gaining this, they continued on and reached a ridge some twelve hundred feet high, which commanded a view of the sea, and of the valley to the south as far as the mountains. The valley seemed to grow wider and deeper as far as the mountains, through which it broke from a southwest direction. No break or defile of any kind offered an outlet to the east. Beyond the east bank was a wide plateau covered with stones, a............