through the end of the hauling-rope." CHAPTER VII LAND AT LAST "Wednesday, July 24th. At last the marvel has come to pass--land, land! and after we had almost given up our belief in it! After nearly two years, we again see something rising above that never-ending white line on the horizon yonder--a white line which for millennium after millennium has stretched over this sea, and which for millenniums to come shall stretch in the same way. We are leaving it, and leaving no trace behind us, for the track of our little caravan across the endless plains has long ago disappeared. A new life is beginning for us; for the ice it is ever the same. "It has long haunted our dreams, this land, and now it comes like a vision, like fairly-land. Drift-white, it arches above the horizon like distant clouds, which one is afraid will disappear every minute. The most wonderful thing is that we have seen this land all the time without knowing it. I examined it several times with the telescope from 'Longing Camp' in the belief that it might be snow-fields, but always came to the conclusion that it was only clouds, as I could never discover any dark point. Then, too, it seemed to change form, which, I suppose, must be attributed to the mist which always lay over it; but it always came back again at the same place with its remarkable regular curves. I now remember that dark crag we saw east of us at the camp, and which I took to be an iceberg. It must certainly have been a little islet [40] of some kind.