57', APRIL 6 AND 7, 1909] We were now at the end of the last long march of the upward journey.

Yet with the Pole actually in sight I was too weary to take the last few steps.

The accumulated weariness of all those days and nights of forced marches and insufficient sleep, constant peril and anxiety, seemed to roll across me all at once.

I was actually too exhausted to realize at the moment that my life's purpose had been achieved.

As soon as our igloos had been completed and we had eaten our dinner and double-rationed the dogs, I turned in for a few hours of absolutely necessary sleep, Henson and the Eskimos having unloaded the sledges and got them in readiness for such repairs as were necessary.