In the Land of White Death: An Epic Story of Survival in the Siberian Arctic Read Online Free PDF

harpooner, is rushing around more than anybody, even though he is among those who will be staying behind. The only ones absent are Lieutenant Brusilov, Miss Zhdanko, and the harpooner Shlensky, all of whom, for over a week now from morning until night, have been writing the letters we shall deliver to people who live in the present—unlike those of us on the ship, who live only in the past and the future, awaiting our deliverance from the polar ice.

    There was little variety in our provisions. The ship’s biscuits, before they were packed, were thoroughly dried, then placed in twenty-pound sacks and hermetically sewn closed. We took one of the three tents included in the
Saint
Anna
’s inventory. It was large, round, and—compared with Nansen’s—very heavy (about sixty pounds). Later, when it became wet and frozen, it was too awkward to carry and we had to leave it behind. But during the first half of our journey by sledge we were very glad to have its protection against the cold and snowstorms. By way of firearms, we carried two repeating rifles, three seal-hunting rifles, and one double-barreled shotgun, with about 120 pounds of ammunition. In addition to all this we had two harpoons, the usual warm clothing, instruments and equipment such as axes, skis, dishes, all sorts of repair material, and so on. Over and above the actual weight of the kayaks and sledges, we had to haul about 2,600 pounds.

    To start with, two men were assigned to pull each kayak/sledge combination. Each of us had a sailcloth hauling strap to which a rope was fastened. The strap was worn over one shoulder and across the chest, and the end of the rope was fastened to one of the forward uprights of the sledge, allowing the man pulling to steady the bow of the attached kayak with one hand and thereby steer the sledge where he wanted, while he held a ski pole in the other. There was one man on each side of the sledge, which would have made it easy to pull, had the route not been blocked at every step by ice hummocks, and had we not been constantly sinking into the snow up to our knees. Alas, we soon had to face the fact that it was practically impossible for only two men to pull each sledge.

    I have already mentioned that there were no maps on board that were of any use to us, and that I had copied our only existing map out of Nansen’s book. Other than that volume and Kolchak’s*
The Ice of the Siberian Sea,
we had no other relevant works. Although Lieutenant Brusilov had bought a small library for hundreds of rubles before our departure, it contained only novels, stories, and old journals—not a single book of any use to us except Nansen’s
Farthest North.
Nansen was our only guide, and provided everything we knew about Franz Josef Land. For example, almost twenty years earlier (1895 to 1896), Nansen and Johansen had crossed the archipelago and wintered in a gloomy hut at a place they christened Jackson Island. The following year, on Northbrook Island near Cape Flora, they met up with Jackson himself, † who had spent several winters there. A small group of buildings had been erected. Perhaps they were still standing, with their store of supplies? Who could say? All we knew was that Nansen spoke highly of the hunting at Cape Flora and Franz Josef Land, and we counted on finding walruses there that we could take by surprise while they slept, and shoot without danger. Drawing all our knowledge from Nansen’s experiences, we treated his book like a precious treasure. I had reread it so often that I could cite entire passages from memory. I had noted all the details in my notebook, particularly those which could help me out of a tight spot, if need be. But what purpose would all this information serve if we could not find this unknown land? I had also copied down the altitude of the sun and astronomy charts for the coming year and a half. I had found these figures in an English technical journal I had come across by chance in the ship’s