which we named after Fridtjof Nansen and Don Pedro Christophersen.

At the bottom of the glacier we saw Ole Engelstad's great snow-cone
rising in the air to 19,000 feet. The glacier was much broken up in
this narrow defile; enormous crevasses seemed as if they would stop
our going farther, but fortunately it was not so bad as it looked.

Our dogs, which during the last few days had covered a distance of
nearly 440 miles, put in a very good piece of work that day, as they
did twenty-two miles on ground rising to 5,770 feet. It was an almost
incredible record. It only took us four days from the barrier to reach
the immense inland plateau. We camped at a height of 7,600 feet. Here
we had to kill twenty-four of our brave dogs, keeping eighteen --
six for each of our three sledges. We halted here for four days on
account of bad weather. On November 25 we were tired of waiting, and
started again. On the 26th we were overtaken by a raging blizzard. In
the thick, driving snow we could see absolutely nothing; but we felt
that, contrary to what we had expected -- namely, a further ascent
-- we were going rapidly downhill. The hypsometer that day showed a
descent of 600 feet. We continued our march next day in a strong wind
and thick, driving snow. Our faces were badly frozen. There was no
danger, but we simply could see nothing. Next day, according to our
reckoning, we reached lat. 86deg.. The hypsometer showed a fall of 800
feet. The following day passed in the same way. The weather cleared up
about noon, and there appeared to our astonished eyes a mighty mountain
range to the east of us, and not far away. But the vision only lasted
a moment, and then disappeared again in the driving snow. On the 29th
the weather became calmer and the sun shone -- a pleasant surprise. Our
course lay over a great glacier, which ran in a southerly direction. On
its eastern side was a chain of mountains running to the southeast. We