By the 2nd of September they had all taken to their skis on which they made great progress alone, but when it came to hauling the sledges there was a difference. Sometimes the snow proved to be very heavy going, particularly when it was wind-packed, and then it was no better than sand. One entry in Nansen's journal will suffice: "It began to snow in the middle of the day, and our work was heavier than ever. It was worse even than yesterday, and to say it was like hauling in blue clay will scarcely give an idea of it. At every step we had to use all our force to get the heavy sledges along, and in the evening Sverdrup and I, who had to go first and plough a way for ourselves, were pretty well done up." [Illustration: ON LEVEL GROUND] When at last the wind became favourable they hoisted sail, and off they went over the waves and drifts of snow at a speed that almost took their breath away; and when they reached the western slopes they slid down them using the sledges as toboggans. At first they had intended making for Christianshaab, but the route had to be changed for that to Godthaab, and the sea was reached some distance to the south. Here they stitched the floor-sheet of their tent over a framework of withies, and with oars made of canvas stretched across forked willows and tied to bamboo shafts, Nansen and Sverdrup boldly trusted themselves to the waves and with much hard labour pulled into Ny Herrnhut on the 3rd of October. Such was the first crossing of Greenland, a really remarkable instance of daring endeavour. Further north, Nordenskiöld, in 1883, had attempted to cross over the ice-cap from near Disco on the west coast, but, hindered and finally stopped by crevasses and other obstacles, could do no more than send his Lapps to try their best on their skis, and they returned after their journey eastwards of a hundred and forty miles reporting similar monotonous conditions all along their track. Thirteen years before, he had, also from Auleitsivik Fiord, started out with Berggren; and deserted by their followers, they had gone on by themselves for some thirty miles east of the northern arm of the fiord. It was on this occasion that Berggren discovered _Ancylonema_, that small poly-cellular alga forming the dark masses that absorb a far greater amount of heat than the white ice and thus cause the deep holes that aid in the process of melting. "The same plant," says Nordenskiöld, "has no doubt played the same part in our country; and we have to thank it, perhaps, that the deserts of ice which formerly covered the whole of Northern Europe and America have now given place to shady woods and undulating cornfields."