There was only a yard
or so more when I had passed my living anchor, and soon I lay with my
dogs around me on the little piece of slob ice. I had to help them on
to it, working them through the lane that I had made.
[Illustration: PART OF DR. GRENFELL'S TEAM]
The piece of ice we were on was so small it was obvious we must soon
all be drowned, if we remained upon it as it drifted seaward into more
open water. If we were to save our lives, no time was to be lost. When
I stood up, I could see about twenty yards away a larger pan floating
amidst the sish, like a great flat raft, and if we could get on to it
we should postpone at least for a time the death that already seemed
almost inevitable. It was impossible to reach it without a life line,
as I had already learned to my cost, and the next problem was how to
get one there. Marvellous to relate, when I had first fallen through,
after I had cut the dogs adrift without any hope left of saving
myself, I had not let my knife sink, but had fastened it by two half
hitches to the back of one of the dogs. To my great joy there it was
still, and shortly I was at work cutting all the sealskin traces
still hanging from the dogs' harnesses, and splicing them together
into one long line. These I divided and fastened to the backs of my
two leaders, tying the near ends round my two wrists.
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