When crossing wide stretches of country we are often obliged to camp if it comes on dark. It is quite impossible to navigate rough country when one cannot see stumps, windfalls, or snags; and I have more than once, while caught in a forest looking for our tilt, been obliged to walk ahead with a light, and even to search the snow for tracks with the help of matches, when one's torch has carelessly been left at home. On one occasion, having stopped our team in deep snow at nightfall, we left it in the woods to walk out to a village, only five or six miles distant, on our snowshoes. We entirely lost our way, and ended up at the foot of some steep cliffs which we had climbed down, thinking that our destination lay at their feet. The storm of the day had broken the sea ice from the land, and we could not get round the base of the cliffs, though we could see the village lights twinkling away, only a mile or two across the bay. Climbing steep hills through dense woods in deep snow in the dark calls for some endurance, especially as a white snow-bank looks like an open space through the dark trees. I have actually stuck my face into a perpendicular bluff, thinking that I was just coming out into the open. Oddly enough, when after much struggling we had mounted the hill, we heard voices, and suddenly met two men, who had also been astray all day, but now knew the way home. They were "all in" for want of food, and preferred camping for the night. A good fire and some chunks of sweet cake so greatly restored them, however, that we got under way again in a couple of hours, further stimulated to do so by the bitter cold, against which, in the dark, we could not make adequate shelter. Moreover, we had perspired with the violent exercise and our clothes were freezing from the inside out. [Illustration: A Hilly Trail A KOMATIK JOURNEY] [Illustration: Crossing a Brook A KOMATIK JOURNEY] You must always carry an axe, not only for firewood, but for getting water--unless you wish to boil snow, which is a slow process, and apt to burn your kettle. Also when you have either lost the trail or there is none, you must have an axe to clear a track as you march ahead of your dogs. Then there is, of course, the unfortunate question of food. Buns baked with chopped pork in them give one fine energy-producing material, and do not freeze. A sweet hard biscuit is made on the coast which is excellent in one's pocket. Cocoa, cooked pork fat, stick chocolate, are all good to have. Our sealers carry dry oatmeal and sugar in their "nonny bags," which, mixed with snow, assuage their thirst and hunger as well. Pork and beans in tins are good, but they freeze badly. I have boiled a tin in our kettle for fifteen minutes, and then found a lump of ice in the middle of the substance when it was turned out into the dish.