THE START. Knorr with six dogs and the "Perseverance," to the upstander of which he had tied a little blue flag bearing this, his motto, "Toujours prêt." Then came a lively group of eight men, each with a canvas belt across his shoulder, to which was attached a line that fastened him to the sledge. Alongside the sledge stood McCormick and Dodge, ready to steer it among the hummocks, and on the sledge was mounted a twenty-foot metallic life-boat with which I hoped to navigate the Polar Sea. The mast was up and the sails were spread, and from the peak floated our boat's ensign, which had seen service in two former Arctic and in one Antarctic voyage, and at the mast-head were run up the Masonic emblems. Our little signal-flag was stuck in the stern-sheets. The sun was shining brightly into the harbor, and everybody was filled with enthusiasm, and ready for the hard pull that was to come. Cheer after cheer met me as I came down the stairway from the deck. At a given signal Radcliffe, who was left in charge of the vessel, touched off the "swivel," "March," cried McCormick, crack went the whips, the dogs sprang into their collars, the men stretched their "track ropes," and the cavalcade moved off.
The events which follow I will give from my "field-*book," trusting that the reader will have sufficient interest in my party to accompany them through the icy wilderness into which they plunged; but for this we will need a new chapter.
