then last year he went to the Yenisei with a cargo from Shields. Oh yes, he's quite at home in the high latitudes, he is.'

6

6

Juell, the steward, is he married too?

6

Why of course he is-married and has children,' said Gjertsen. That fine figure of a woman you saw on board on the way from Christiania to Horten, you know-that's his wife. She's been a lot about with him, too. A few years ago she went with him right to the Gold Coast, and when they were going ashore, Juell thought he should never see

his wife again--for all of a sudden the boatmen, the niggers you know, as naked as my hand, took and seized her in their arms and jumped into the water with her. Juell believed he'd seen the last of her; for you know, she's uncommonly plump and appetising, and he thought no doubt they were cannibals, these fellows.'

Then a great many of you are married?' I said.

6

'Oh yes, we've almost all got some one to leave behind,' answered Hendriksen. Amundsen heads the list, he does, for he has five or six children; then Nordal has five, Juell

and I have four apiece, and then-let me see-Petterson has two I think, and--

'And Nansen and I have one apiece,' added the mate.

My thoughts flew back to little Liv, and I turned my head and saw him still sitting up there upon the bridge, busy with his painting, as though he had never in his life done anything else. He had taken off his cap in order to see better, and was shading the picture with his arm or looking through the hollow of his hand to get a concentrated impression of the colour. His bust stood out boldly, the massive head with the short

clipped hair showing in sharp outline against the indescribably pure and clear colours of the evening sky. Were his thoughts bent on his distant goal, or were they at home with little Liv in her cradle?

The evening air began to grow chill, so I rose to go below and get hold of my

JOHANSEN

greatcoat. As before mentioned, it was no such easy matter to make your way about on the deck of the Fram; so I remarked jokingly, One would need either four legs or a pair of wings to get about among all this litter.

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6

You should do as Johansen did,' answered the mate. He walked on his hands the other day up the steps from the fo'c'sle, across the whole of the forward deck, up the steps to the after deck, and down the companion into the cabin and I'm bothered if he was even red in the face when he put his feet down again upon the floor of the saloon.'

BB

'Oh, that's nothing for Johansen, he's the first gymnast in Norway,' remarked Gjertsen. In Paris, he made a clean somersault over forty-two men, so that the Frenchmen thought there would be nothing but a wet spot left when he came down. But he fell on his feet, as right as possible. He got a gold medal for that, too!

'Amundsen's not bad at that sort of thing, either, you know. What do you think he did the other day down at Rörvik, while we were loading all that beastly coal? He was up in the main-top and wanted to come down to the deck, forward. Confound me if he didn't slide down the stay from the maintop to the fore-top, holding on by his hands alone all the way! There isn't another man on board could have done it ; but Amundsen's fists are as hard as shoe leather, and no mistake. And then, of course, he's a bit lighter than I am, for example,' said Gjertsen.

I, unable to emulate either of these feats, made my way as well as I could over the obstacles that bestrewed the after deck, past the chart-room, in the open doorway of which several powder-casks were piled up drying, and down the cabin companion-a journey which, if it did not require a gymnast of the first rank, was certainly not to be recommended to a gouty subject or a fat man.

The cabin steps went right past the galley, where Juell was at that moment deep in his culinary occupations. A tempting smell of cooking greeted my nostrils, and I looked in for a moment to warm myself a little and have a chat.

Juell stood in his shirt-sleeves busy at his work, the perspiration pouring down his high forehead, and his heavy moustaches drooping like a bridle from the corners of his mouth.

Warm! I should think it was! When all the pots are boiling for dinner I believe the devil himself would singe his nose if he poked it in here. It's the hardest job I've ever had in my life. I've made many a voyage in my day, but this is the first time I've shipped as cook, and if I come safe and sound back again, it shall be the last time! Take my advice, Professor, and never be a cook, whatever you

are.'

'No, no, Juell-we can't all be tailors, you know. I don't suppose I'm in much danger of receiving an appointment as chef. But when you

JUELL

back, I daresay it won't be such a bad trip after all.'

6

Peik' was the popular name for an insulated cookingapparatus, of Finne's invention, a great contrivance which held the warmth very long. Nansen took a lively interest in it, and several times, while I was on board, assisted at the cooking of the dinner, in order to familiarise himself with the working of Peik. And Peik cooked many excellent things. The fare on board the Fram, in spite of Juell's apologies for his deficiencies as a culinary artist, was really

6

1 Thanks for our last meeting'-a common form of salutation.

capital and not at all monotonous. The menu generally consisted of soup or fish, and a dish of meat, with half a bottle of beer a head, so long as the beer lasted. I remember, for instance, that the first dinner I ate on board consisted of tinned fish-puddings from Stavanger, tinned rabbit from Australia, and wild ducks which Nansen had shot on the way. A great variety of German preserved vegetables were used in the soups, and American cranberry jam was often served with the meat. The provisioning of the ship, like all the rest of its equipment, was most carefully thought out in all its details. There was a particularly large supply of vegetables and of fatty matter, so that, so long as it stuck to the Fram, the expedition should not suffer from 'fat-hunger,' as the Greenland explorers had suffered. There were no less than 13,000 lbs. of butter on board, one-third of it the best Danish butter, and the rest superfine margarine, a present from Pellerin & Co. While I was on board we ate nothing but this margarine; it was of such excellent quality that I do not think anyone would have taken it for artificial butter, unless he had been told.

On the whole, the ship was lavishly provisioned; you could scarcely name a thing that was not in stock, and generally in considerable quantities. One thing, however, was entirely absent, and that was alcohol-for drinking, that is to say. The spirits for preserving specimens 'would scarcely come under the heading of commissariat.

A passing steamer in Trondhiem fiord had thrown us a bottle of port wine, bidding us drink it at the North Pole. This was--with the exception of the beer, which was calculated to last for a couple of months-all the drinkable alcohol on board. You must lay in one or two bottles of champagne in Tromsö, Nansen,' I said one day in a joke, ' to drink a skaal