What chance would a man in a sleeping-bag have, should he suddenly wake to find himself in the water?
The difficulties and hardships of a journey to the North Pole are too complex to be summed up in a paragraph.

But, briefly stated, the worst of them are: the ragged and mountainous ice over which the traveler must journey with his heavily loaded sledges; the often terrific wind, having the impact of a wall of water, which he must march against at times; the open leads already described, which he must cross and recross, somehow; the intense cold, sometimes as low as 60 deg.

below zero, through which he must--by fur clothing and constant activity--keep his flesh from freezing; the difficulty of dragging out and back over the ragged and "lead" interrupted trail enough pemmican, biscuit, tea, condensed milk, and liquid fuel to keep sufficient strength in his body for traveling.
It was so cold much of the time on this last journey that the brandy was frozen solid, the petroleum was white and viscid, and the dogs could hardly be seen for the steam of their breath.

The minor discomfort of building every night our narrow and uncomfortable snow houses, and the cold bed platform of that igloo on which we must snatch such hours of rest as the exigencies of our desperate enterprise permitted us, seem hardly worth mentioning in comparison with the difficulties of the main proposition itself.
At times one may be obliged to march all day long facing a blinding snowstorm with the bitter wind searching every opening in the clothing.
Those among my readers who have ever been obliged to walk for even an hour against a blizzard, with the temperature ten or twenty degrees _above_ zero, probably have keen memories of the experience.

Probably they also remember how welcome was the warm fireside of home at the end of their journey.