ince of Wales. This, Jarvis told
me, was one of the worst bits of road on the entire trip. Here's what
Jarvis said himself about it:

"'As I remember it, the thermometer was over thirty below zero and there
was a tidy blizzard blowing when we started for Cape Prince of Wales.
The going was rough beyond words. In the afternoon, suddenly Artisarlook
wanted to camp, but I thought he was trying to work on my fears, so I
made him go on. But the boy was right, for shortly after it got dark we
struck the bluffs near Cape York and our road was over the ice crushes
that lined the shore.

"'I have never seen such a road. Artisarlook went ahead to try and pick
out the way, if indeed it could be called a way, which was nothing but
blocks of ice heaped in confusion and disorder. I stayed behind to
manage the heavy sled which was continually capsizing in the rough ice.
By eight o'clock I was done out and quite willing to camp. But this time
Artisarlook would not stop. It was too cold to camp on the ice without
shelter or wood--the ice we were on was in danger of breaking away from
the bluffs at any minute, and then it might be the end of us. We must
get on beyond the line of bluffs before stopping.

"'To make matters worse I stepped through a crack in the ice into the
water, and, almost instantaneously, my leg to the knee was a mass of
ice. I was now compelled to go on to some place where the foot-gear
could be dried. As though in a dream, suffering the most horrible
tortures of fatigue, we pushed on dispiritedly until midnight, when we
came to a small hut about ten by twelve, in which fifteen people were
already sleeping. It was the most horrible place I have ever been in,
but, at the same time, I was never so happy to be under a roof before.
Though I had eaten nothing all day, I was too tired to do more than to
crawl into my sleeping-bag and sleep.

"'The blizzard raged as fiercely outside as on the day before, but I
could not stay in that pestilential and filthy hut. Even
Artisarlook--and an Eskimo is not over-particular--found difficulty in
eating his breakfast. For my part--I could not breathe. The air was
horrible and it was refreshing to get outside and to be going through
the storm and over the rough ice. Fortunately there was another village
about ten miles further on and we stopped there and had a good meal to
fortify ourselves against the battle around the mountains of the Cape
York.

"'At last I had struck the worst