The brandy, of course, was solid, the petroleum was white and viscid, and the dogs as they traveled were enveloped in the white cloud of their own breath.
I traveled ahead of my division this march, and whenever I looked back could see neither men nor dogs--only a low-lying bank of fog glistening like silver in the horizontal rays of the sun behind it to the south--this fog being the steam of the dog teams and the men.
[Illustration: A CHARACTERISTIC VIEW OF THE EXPEDITION ON THE MARCH IN FINE WEATHER (Indian File Used to Economize the Strength of Men and Dogs and to Accentuate the Trail.

The Passage of Each Sledge Makes the Trail Easier for the Ones Behind It)] The going during this march was fairly good, except at the beginning, where for about five miles we zigzagged through a zone of very rough ice.

The distance covered was at least twelve miles.

Our camp that night was on a large old floe in the lee of a large hummock of ice and snow.
Just as we had finished building our igloos, one of the Eskimos who was standing on the top of the hummock shouted excitedly: "Kling-mik-sue!" (Dogs are coming.) In a moment I was on the hummock beside him.

Looking south I could see, a long distance away, a little bank of silvery white mist lying on our trail.