Rivers and lakes would be frozen then.

That might make traveling easier, if they could pick up the hand sleds they had cached; but there was a limit to the provisions they could transport, and unless fresh supplies could be obtained they would have a long distance to traverse on scanty rations in the rigors of the arctic winter.
After a day or two the Indians, who were going no farther, landed them, and they entered a belt of very broken country across which they must push to reach a larger stream.

The ground was rocky, pierced by ravines, and covered with clumps of small trees.

There were stony tracts across which they painfully picked their way, steep ridges to be clambered over, and belts of quaggy muskeg they must skirt.

Benson, however, gave them no trouble; the man was getting hard and was generally cheerful; and when he had an occasional fit of moroseness, as he fought with the longing that tormented him, they left him alone.
Still, at times they were daunted by the rugged sternness of the region they were steadily pushing through, and the thought of the long return journey troubled them.
One night, when it was raining, they sat beside their fire in a desolate gorge.