we wore an outer covering of windproof material, so as not to wear
them out too quickly. These mits are not very strong, though they are
good and warm. Besides these, we had ten pairs of ordinary kid mits,
which were bought at a glove-shop in Christiania, and were practically
impossible to wear out. I wore mine from Framheim to the Pole and back
again, and afterwards on the voyage to Tasmania. The lining, of course,
was torn in places, but the seams of the mits were just as perfect as
the day I bought them. Taking into consideration the fact that I went
on ski the whole way and used two poles, it will be understood that
the mits were strongly made. We also had a number of woollen gloves,
which, curiously enough, the others greatly prized. For myself, I was
never able to wear such things; they simply freeze the fingers off me.

But most important of all is the covering of the feet, for the feet
are the most exposed members and the most difficult to protect. One
can look after the hands; if they grow cold it is easy to beat them
into warmth again. Not so with the feet; they are covered up in the
morning, and this is a sufficiently troublesome piece of work to make
one disinclined to undo it again until one is turning in. They cannot
be seen in the course of the day, and one has to depend entirely on
feeling; but feeling in this case often plays curious tricks. How
often has it happened that men have had their feet
frozen off without knowing it! For if they had known it, they could not
possibly have let it go so far. The fact is that in this case sensation
is a somewhat doubtful guide, for the feet lose all sensation. It
is true that there is a transitional stage, when one feels the
cold smarting in one's toes, and tries to get rid of it by stamping
the feet. As a rule this is successful; the warmth returns, or the
circulation is restored; but it occasionally happens that sensation is
lost at the very moment when these precautions are taken. And then one