November 21st, Henson and three Eskimos left with loads, and on the 22d I followed with a party of three to begin the work of the November moon. This work ended just after midnight of December 4th, when the last sledges came in. It left 3,300 pounds of supplies and a quantity of dog-food at Cape Wilkes, on the north side of Richardson Bay. These supplies would have been left at Cape Lawrence had it not been for the desertion and turning back of one of my men, discouraged with the hard work, while crossing Richardson Bay. Knowing it to be essential to prevent any recurrence of the kind, I pushed on to Cape Wilkes, camped and turned in after a twenty-five-hours day, slept three hours, then started with empty sledge, eight picked dogs, and an Eskimo driver, to overtake my man. He was found at Cape Louis Napoleon, and, after receiving a lesson, was taken along with me to the ship. My party was left with instructions to bring up supplies which the wrecking of sledges had obliged me to cache at various places, assemble all at Cape Wilkes, and then, if I did not return, reconnoitre the ice-foot to Rawlings Bay, and return to the ship. The distance from Cape Wilkes to the _Windward_ was sixty nautical miles in a straight line (as travelled by me along the ice-foot and across the bays, not less than ninety statute miles); and was covered in 23 hours and 20 minutes, or 21 hours 30 minutes actual travelling time. Temperature during the run –50° F. Every sledge was more or less smashed in this two weeks’ campaign, and at Cape John Barrow sledges and loads had to be carried on our backs over the ice jams. The mean daily minimum temperature for the thirteen days was –41.2° F., the lowest –50° F., which occurred on four successive days. The experience gained on this trip led me to believe that the conditions of travel from Cape Wilkes northward as far at least as Cape Defosse would not differ materially from those already encountered, and enabled me to lay my plans with somewhat greater detail. With the light of the December moon I would proceed to Cape Wilkes with such loads as would enable me to travel steadily without double-banking, advance everything to Cape Lawrence on the north side of Rawlings Bay, then go on to Fort Conger with light sledges, determine the condition of the supplies left there that I might know what I could depend upon, and then return to the ship. In the January moon I would start with my entire party; move supplies from Cape Lawrence to Fort Conger; remain there till the February moon, the light of which would merge into the beginning of the returning daylight; then sledge the supplies for the polar journey to Cape Hecla, and be in readiness to start from there with rested and well-fed dogs by the middle of March.