The detailed plan was to leave Sweden as early as possible in the autumn of 1901 for the South Shetlands, whence the vessel was to go to the east coast of the land known to lie to the south of those islands. Penetrating as far to the south as possible, a station was to be established at any convenient point and a party of six left there, with the necessary stores, apparatus, and equipment, to spend the winter, while the ship was to return north to the Falkland Islands and spend the winter with the remainder of the expedition carrying out scientific investigations at Tierra del Fuego and South Georgia. On the arrival of spring the _Antarctica_ was to pick up the members of the expedition who might be in Tierra del Fuego and South Georgia and proceed south to the winter station, take on board the members who had passed the winter there, and return at once to Sweden. Unfortunately for the successful carrying out of the plans, the summer of 1902-3, in the Antarctic regions, was the coldest and the worst for ice conditions that has ever been recorded, and the expedition, instead of being able to carry out the plans laid down, experienced, instead, a series of unexpected happenings which was fatal to the exact working out of detail, but was rich in exciting and romantic episode. The Frozen South, like the Frozen North, will not yield its secrets to the first comer who demands them. The resources of the ice world, at either pole, are too vast to be overcome without a fierce and prolonged struggle. Instead of one winter, the Swedish expedition spent two in the ice region, while, during the second, all the members of it were living on the ice, though as three separate parties, each within a few miles of the other, and all, more or less, ignorant of the proximity of their comrades. The peculiar circumstances under which they became separated, their experiences during that time, and the dramatic manner in which they were reunited and rescued, will form the chief incidents of the following pages. Leaving Sweden on October 17, 1901, the _Antarctica_ proceeded to South America, where, at the request of the Argentine Government, a representative of that country, in the person of Lieutenant Sobral, of the Navy, joined the expedition. In return for this courtesy the Argentine Government offered to do all it could to assist the expedition. How magnificently it carried out its promise will be seen later.