This is true heroism.
As the saying on the coast goes, "'tis dogged as does it," and as
Grenfell himself says, "not inspiration, but perspiration wins the
prizes of life." They finally reached the crest of the hill.
On the opposite or weather side of the hill the gale met them with
full force. It had swept the slope clean and left it a glade of ice.
They slid down at a dangerous speed, taking all sorts of chances,
colliding in the darkness with stumps and ice-coated rocks and other
snags, in imminent danger of having their brains knocked out or limbs
broken.
The open places below were little better. Everything was ice-coated.
They slipped and slid about, falling and rising with every dozen
steps. If they threw themselves on the sledges to ride the dogs came
to a stop, for they could not haul them. If they walked they could not
keep their feet. Their course took them along the bed of Bartlett
River, and twice Grenfell and some of the others broke through into
the icy rapids.
At half past one in the morning they reached the mouth of Bartlett
River where it empties into the sea and between them and Cape Norman
lay twenty miles of unobstructed sea ice.
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