We could see up the New Glacier, which was badly crevassed in many

places. I came round to the opinion of Debenham and Gran, that it

would be wiser to portage all our gear up the 1000 feet cliffs of the

Flat Iron, and so gain the quiet area behind the latter. We returned

to Cape Geology, and packed a fortnight’s provisions and gear for our

journey up the Mackay Glacier.

I caught many of the insects I had discovered on arriving at Cape

Geology. Indeed, later Debenham found them under most of the stones,

clustering among the whitish roots or hyphæ of the moss. They would be

frozen stiff in a thin film of ice until one turned the stone into the

sun. Then the ice would melt, and they would move sluggishly about

until the sun left them, when their damp habitation froze again! I

cannot imagine a finer example of hibernation, for it looked as if

they pursued an active life only when a beneficent explorer let in a

little sunlight on them! Debenham detected a little red species which

was much more nimble than the millimetre-long blue ones, and I had

much trouble in catching six of them; but the others were more easily

managed. I smeared a piece of paper with seccotine, and then, taking a

small brush from the medical outfit, I brushed them by hundreds on to

the paper. “Seccotine sticks everything,” and the _aptera_ were no

exception. In a few moments they were securely embalmed like the flies

in amber, and so we safely carried a thousand of these unknown insects

back to civilization.

At noon on the 27th we arrived at the foot of the Flat Iron again, and

started our big task. Like most premeditated ills, it was not so

difficult as anticipated. First we had some tea on a little gravelly

ledge about a hundred feet up, and then packed the gear for transport

up the mile of angular granite blocks which lay between us and the top

of the Flat Iron. Forde and Gran carried the sledge on their

shoulders, and, as may be imagined, had a most uncomfortable journey

with this “old man of the ice” to handicap their scramble. Debenham

and I carried food and gear, and in about a dozen journeys everything

was perched high up on the Flat Iron’s summit. Open water was visible

from five hundred feet, so that it was still about twenty-five miles

away. Pennell had not much chance of reaching the rendezvous unless

the ice went out at a mile a day.

We left our snug gravel island next day, and knotted ourselves well to

the sledge. We were now to journey for some days over the Mackay

Glacier, and though we naturally chose the smoothest and least

disturbed ice for our route, yet we had to pass near areas full of

huge crevasses. I had less anxiety than ever to fall into one, for I

could not use my right hand at all yet. However, the other three were

almost too prompt to pull me out, as I realized a week or two later.

We zigzagged down on the snow plateau. This is about ten miles wide,

and seven miles from east to west. It is bounded by the New Glacier

crevasses on the south, and by rock islands which we called Redcliff

and Mount Suess on the west, by the chaos of the Mackay Skauk on the

north, and by the Flat Iron and Cuff Cape Glaciers to the east, where

there is a 1000 feet drop into Granite Harbour.

“The surface was covered with deep snow; we don’t know what is

beneath. There are many indications of east-west depressions in the

snow into which we fell occasionally, but I am not sure if they were

crevasses. The surface often fell in with a widespread sigh, which was

eerie but harmless.

“To the south is a wonderful series of peaks about five thousand feet

high, forming a wall of giant cwms. Probably they form the divide from

the next great valley (of the Debenham Glacier). Quite a number of

these peaks show a recurved spine on the summit, which is probably due

to the weathering of dolerite crags. To the north-west is a mountain

approaching seven thousand feet, which is capped by dolerite lava.”

(We called it Black-cap at first, but it is now officially known as

Mount Tryggve Gran, after our ever-cheerful comrade.) “In the face of

this mountain are faulted white bands which are probably Beacon

Sandstone.”

That evening we camped on Redcliff _Nunakol_. This latter term I

invented with Gran’s assistance to describe a rock island resembling a

_nunatak_, but rounded by previous glacial erosion. The nunatak has

properly never been below the ice; hence its name, from the Icelandic

_nuna_, lonely, and _tak_, a jagged peak. Nunakol is from _nuna_,

lonely, and _kol_, a rounded ridge.

[Illustration:

Mount Suess Nunatak, looking west from Redcliff, December 29, 1912.

]

We placed the tent on a patch of gravel near to a little waterfall. I

followed up this stream, and found that it rose in some swampy ground

where a little moss was growing. Next morning we all explored the

Nunakol, which was 1080 feet above the glacier. The top was more or

less flat, and as usual consisted of granite covered with much debris.

I managed to do some sketching, and was especially interested in the

numerous pot-holes cut out in granite by the wind. They were about a

foot in diameter and eight inches deep, and each contained some

pebbles by which they had been scoured out.

To assist our survey we named many of the peaks and glaciers around

us. The sharp peak to the north (which I usually made the datum for

the theodolite angles) we called the “Referring Facet.” A large

tributary glacier to the east of this was named the Cleveland Glacier

by Debenham. He explained that it was after a large family, and so

required a correspondingly large natural feature! Red Ridge was to the

south, and formed of red granite. Killer Ridge had the shape of an

_orca_, Sperm Bluff was a black headland like the blunt head of the

sperm whale. Pegtop and Dome nunataks are self-explanatory. We were

quite close to Mount Suess, and obtained a fine view of this nunatak.

Its three dolerite peaks, the armchair hollow, and the bulwark on the

north-east, supported by huge granite cliffs, made it a very striking

object.

On the 30th the day was overcast, and it snowed most of the time. We

could not leave the tent, and lay snug in our bags and mended gear. I

did some useful darning, using seaming twine to repair my socks. They

were lasting splendidly. “I mended them with my left hand; so far I am

still wearing the same socks for eight weeks. If I could darn easily,

I’d keep to them for our whole fourteen weeks....” Such was the

practical value of my patent canvas heel-tips!

Debenham and I made a set of chess pieces from cardboard, and we

played on his survey plane-table. It took a week or two to get used to

the men, but we had many games later while we were marooned on Cape

Roberts.

On the last day of the year we pulled westward to Gondola Ridge. “All

was snow-covered, and we sank four inches into it, but the sledge

pulled pretty well. There was no sun, but I got in a cold sweat with

the work. Now and again our feet would sink a foot or two. There must

be plenty of crevasses round this corner of the nunakol, but we

trusted the fates and plugged on. The snow was so deep that we did not

break through the bridges anywhere. The sun came out to cheer us, and

soon we heard the old creaking due to ‘bottle-glass’ ice and

‘glass-house’ ice....” I knew this meant an ancient undisturbed

glacier from our experience up the Koettlitz Glacier, and felt that we

were safely past the crevasses.

About noon we had approached close to Gondola Ridge, which extends

northward from Mount Suess. Here we came to a sudden ice cliff, but

the slope was not too steep for us to toboggan down it on to a lake

surface fringing the moraines. I expect thaw waters had cut out the

cliff. Here were fine debris cones just like those of Cape Evans, but

larger, and formed not only of dolerite, but of granite and Beacon

Sandstone.

[Illustration: Sketch Map of Mt. Suess Nunatak and Gondola Nunakol

5·1·12]

“We pushed on for a whitish silt-bank, and then left the sledge near

it among the black and white rocks composing the moraine. The

silt-bank was a huge heap like a railway embankment. It was twenty

feet high, and composed of Beacon Sandstone debris. A little lake lay

at the foot, and its flat top made a splendid camp site. ‘Here, on

soil formed of real sand, like that near Sydney, we pitched our

tent:’—probably the first time such a thing had been done in Victoria

Land. We found a bounteous water supply by cutting through the ice of

the little lake, for alongside a big black boulder the radiation of

the sun’s heat had melted the ice. This was a great saving, for none

of our precious oil was now wasted in melting the ice.”

There was an extraordinary mixture of dolerite and sandstone all over

the Gondola Ridge. The sandstone was characterized by blebs, which in

Germany would be called “Knoten.” We called it briefly “smallpoxy,”

and it did not look hopeful for fossils. However, there was some shale

near the tent, which looked more hopeful. We did not find much beyond

worm-casts and ripple-marks at first.

The discovery of fossils was of especial importance to Australia,

because the central Antarctic area had served as a distributing base

for Australian animals and plants. The marsupials are represented by a

few forms in South America and New Guinea, and there seems little

doubt that land extended more or less continuously between these

limits. Earlier still South Africa was joined to this Antarctic world,

for land-worms allied to those in the other southern continents are

now known from Cape Colony.

When Gran and I returned from our first survey of the ridge we found

that Debenham had already been successful in the shales. He had found

some vesicular horny plates. I turned to, and soon obtained two large

pieces like the red tiles capping a roof-ridge. They were nearly two

inches long, and had a well-marked keel. There were also smaller

complete plates. On our return to Europe these were identified as the

armour-plate of primitive fish, and probably of Devonian age. So that

our find on Gondola Ridge added a new epoch to Antarctic fossils, for

Cambrian limestones were known, and Permian coal-measures were

indicated by Shackleton’s specimens. These fish plates identified

another set of sediments midway between them.

The moraines near our camp, though by no means so abundant as on a

smaller European glacier, were the most important which I saw actually

on a glacier in the Antarctic. To the north-east two medial moraines

stretched out from the ridge and enclosed an area which we called the

Harbour (see p. 391). In a warm summer this is probably a lake. One

striking “piebald” debris cone was half white and half black. It was

twenty-five feet high, and the eastern portion had resulted from the

weathering of a huge “erratic” of sandstone, while a similar mass of

dolerite had broken up to form the western half of the heap.

Even so far up and away from the sea we found some lichens. These

diminutive plants were busily etching the surface of the granite just

as in more clement climes. Beautiful rounded and polished platforms

were quite abundant on the ridge. Occasionally a hard band of porphyry

would project and show almost a glaze where the coarser granite had

been weathered and dulled.

[Illustration: Erratic perched on six small stones, Gondola Ridge]

We could now see uninterruptedly to the great ice plateau. Only one

nunatak lay between us and the outlet ice-falls near Mount Gran. We

saw many examples of perched blocks, some being deposited on top of

polished faces of granite. One huge block, which I sketched, had been

lowered gently by the ice on to four “legs,” at one corner composed of

two small stones. Between Mount Suess and Gondola Ridge was a definite

“col” or low pass containing small tarns and covered with debris. We

returned to the camp by this route, and had no difficulty in

clambering down its eastern outlet.

The 2nd of January was a cold gloomy morning. The clouds settled down

and swathed everything in a clammy mantle. I dared not move far from

the tent, and so we broke up shales and collected more of what Evans

called “sarpent critters.” I found a few brilliant blue plates with a

lustre like that on the elytræ of beetles! I walked over the north end

of the ridge where the solid granite was broken into large “bricks”

separated by several inches. These blocks seemed to have moved to the

east, and this movement may be due to glacier “plucking”; but I think

it is merely the result of frost cleavage followed later by rock

“creep.” At any rate it was very common on the “floors” left by the

recession of the ice-sheet.

Debenham in his prowl for specimens had discovered a coal-mine! In

this case it was not a large one, and consisted of a fine lump of

brown coal about four inches across.

On the 3rd Gran and I determined to circumnavigate Mount Suess. This

most striking mountain lay about one mile south of us. It towered 3000

feet above Gondola ridge and was a most impressive sight. The upper

layer consisted of black dolerite, largely showing columnar structure.

The main mass was formed of reddish granite. It stood out foursquare

like some gigantic castle keep (see Fig., p. 383). The centre was

hollowed out and three cusps or peaks rose at the north, west, and

south angles respectively. In fact, it resembled more than anything an

ancient molar tooth, though this parallel libels its rugged grandeur.

As we marched round its east face we came on more and more dolerite in

the moraine. This had evidently been swept round the south of the

mount, and as this moraine contained the sandstone fossils it was very

important to see where the moraine originated. Between the mount and

the glacier to the south was a low col of granite from which talus

debris reached upwards almost to the dolerite cap. The mount itself

looked yellow, but I found this was due to a yellow tint in the

granite.

The sky was clouding, and we had still a long way to go. So we hurried

round to the west side of the mount, and here I saw what I had

expected, that between the granite base and the dolerite capping there

was a long “lenticle” of yellow sediments. It was, however, quite

inaccessible from below, and after making a sketch we marched on the

north. On this side there was very little talus. We clambered along

over granite terraces some 300 feet above the glacier. We crossed the

top of the north col without difficulty and proceeded over Gondola

Ridge to the tent. Later, Debenham and Forde appeared. They had found

an easy route to the central hollow of the mount, which we called “The

Deck,” but had not had time to ascend one of the peaks.

On the 4th the morning was clear, and I felt that we could not do

better than get the theodolite on the top of Mount Suess, and so

connect up many of the distant peaks with our survey.

[Illustration: Sketch-diagram of the SW Face of Mt Suess showing the

fossil-bearing Beacon Sandstones 3–1–12]

Debenham decided to stay below and continue his plane-table survey.

Gran took his camera, and Forde and I carried the theodolite, etc. We

climbed up the gap at the north corner, and then scrambled along a

slope full of snow-covered boulders which lay between the main peaks

and the 1800 feet Rampart. This latter feature seemed as if pierced

for guns also! Possibly the gap and the “ports” were due to the

weathering away of volcanic dykes in the granite. They did not look as

if ice had cut them out. Where the gap emerged on the “Deck” were two

little tarns at about 1200 feet above the tent.

Gran proceeded to climb the central-west cusp of the mount, thinking

it the highest. Forde and I attacked the south-west peak. The slope

was very steep and covered at first with grey granite, black dolerite,

and yellow sandstone blocks. At 2000 feet only the dolerite blocks

were seen, so that I feel sure that the sandstone crops out _inside_

the hollow of the mount (between the granite and dolerite) as well as

on its western face.

At 1.40 I reached the top and found that it was 3000 feet above the

tent. I set up the theodolite and obtained a fine series of angles.

Sighting on Gran’s peak, which he had just surmounted, I found it was

two degrees lower, which I estimated at about a hundred feet, whereat

he was somewhat crestfallen. However, he walked across after obtaining

a splendid set of photos of the landscape spread out before us. The

actual summit was fairly flat for a few yards, with a thousand feet

precipice on the south and west. Far out to sea we could see miles of

open water, especially to the south, with floes drifting in it, but it

did not seem much nearer than a month ago.

To the south a deep fiord-like valley seemed to pierce right through

the Gonville Range. It was of course filled with ice, and was, I

think, what the Americans call a transection glacier. Probably it

connected the Mackay Glacier with the Debenham Glacier. The cliffs at

its west portal were cut into giant “forts,” and bands of beacon

sandstone showed clearly enough above the granite.

To the south lay the Sperm nunakol. It was only a mile away, and we

seemed to be right over it. It showed a flat surface covered with

debris much like the Flat Iron. The Peg Top nunakol seemed to have

lost its knob-like appearance. It was somewhat =Ꭲ=-shaped, the front

bar rising like a crocodile’s head from the covering of ice. To the

south of this rock island there seemed an easy route up to the

Plateau—good enough for ponies, if the first step up to the “Flat

Iron” could be negotiated.

A very high mountain, possibly 10,000 feet, showed to the west. We

could not estimate its distance properly, for all our survey angles to

it were so acute.

After spending two and a half hours on the summit we hurried back to

the camp, and found that Debenham had passed a useful if uneventful

day.

[Illustration:

Gondola Ridge from the top of Mount Suess, looking north-east, January

4, 1912, showing the “deck,” ramparts, and medial moraines.

]

On the 6th of January we took down the tent and transported our gear

across the rugged moraines to the sledge. While I was packing the fish

scales in cotton-wool, the other three had found more coal near the

sledge, and they soon collected five specimen bags full. It was

undoubtedly derived from Beacon Sandstone beds close to our camp, and

possibly from the outcrop we had seen on Mount Suess.

We marched straight back to the Flat Iron, camping for lunch about

halfway. It was interesting to note the way the snow lay in various

regions. Small cwm valleys at low levels were filled with snow and

ice, while large plains at higher elevations to the west were seen to

be almost bare. Perhaps the snowfall varies with height, while the

ablation (evaporation) may depend largely on the wind direction.

Next day we devoted to a survey of the Flat Iron. I went to the

northern face to see if we could drag or lower the sledge down the

glacier without unloading it. I had a light camera and was able to

take a few interesting photographs. The first looking over Cuff Cape

to the north illustrated the following physiographic features: the ice

face, crevasses, skauk, young calf-bergs, moraines, retreating

glacier, granite pavements, shear cracks in bay ice, the ice tongue,

facets on the cliffs, cwms, overflows, hog-bag ridges, the junction of

the granite and dolerite, and the Kar Plateau—all on one quarter-plate

negative!

To the south was the small tarn I have mentioned earlier. The furrowed

face of Mount England was reflected in its still water, and a solitary

skua gull was preening his feathers on a boulder in the lake. I

managed to get a successful photo here also.

Meanwhile a sea fog was rolling in from the east. Gradually it blotted

out all the features below us. I had just time to hurry back to the

tent before everything around us vanished. Debenham turned up a minute

or two later, but I was getting anxious when Forde and Gran returned.

It is impossible to find one’s way in these fogs, and exposure to

Antarctic weather is a thing to be dreaded even in summer.

Next morning we started transporting our gear down to the bay ice. We

followed our former route, which certainly seemed to have been the

best. We had now to carry down many specimens, for the Flat Iron was a

wonderful collecting ground. The main mass is grey granite, but it

includes many varieties of schist and bands of altered limestone;

gabbros, amphibolites, quartz porphyries, marble, mica-schists,

felsites and rhyolites were mostly _in situ_, while erratics of basalt

and sandstone were common.

[Illustration:

GRAN’S MIDSUMMER BATH, DEC. 21, 1911.

A small tarn of the Devil’s Ridge overlooking the Punchbowl (300 feet

below). Across the latter appears the Dewdrop Glacier. The tarn is

held back by a snowdrift glacieret.

[_See p. 378._

]

[Illustration:

_Photo by Gran._]

THE COULOIRS OF MOUNT ENGLAND (WHICH DEVELOP INTO CWMS LATER).

The Flat Iron hides the base of the mountains. In the foreground the

ice-foot of Cuff Cape.

]

The rough shaking to which our gear was subjected resulted in our

losing the top of the theodolite tripod, the pump-knob on the Primus,

and the sight-ruler! Debenham found the latter, but we had to use

makeshifts for the other lost articles.

At 7 p.m. we were back at Cape Geology. Each time we returned we found

the pressure ridges and tide crack off the cape had altered in shape

and made our approach more difficult. The skua gulls had found our

blubber store and were gobbling it up as rapidly as they were able.

Our hut floor was inches thick in ice, but we gave up trying to make

the hut comfortable, and the cook shivered out there at the stove, and

then brought the food down to the tent, where we ate it in comfort.

At this time we were devoutedly hoping for wind, so that some of the

sea-ice should blow away and permit the ship to reach us. Captain

Pennell was due any day now, but the bay ice looked as solid as when

we had entered in November.

[Illustration: Sea-kale at 77°s. 8–1–12]

We inspected the “vegetable garden” and found that twelve dicotyledons

had sprouted! I imagine these are the first grown in the open air

within the Antarctic circle! They seemed thirsty, so I gave them some

water. But, alas! the weather rapidly grew colder. Every day a few

were blighted, and, finally, I carefully gathered the remnants and

placed them in my pocket-book as a record of Gran’s well-meant

experiment.

I was much disappointed with the moss. It lay in peaty clods between

the boulders, usually in lumps about the size of a large bath bun, and

had formed a considerable amount of humus. But it remained almost

black and dead all this summer. Usually January 15th is the warmest

day, but this season December was much warmer than January, and I

think the backward condition of the moss showed that it was an

exceptionally severe summer.

I was now cook again, and will copy some of my cooking notes. “At 4.30

I dug up the seal meat cache, and found a whole liver buried deep

under a layer of ice. It all seemed fresh, and Forde helped me to cut

it up on a board outside the hut. Then I got the stove lighted by

blubbery paper pretty easily, and the cooker full of water. I heated

this for cocoa till it began to sing, and then put on the frying-tray.

This latter was the base of our cooker, but served excellently as a

pan; except that it was so large that one part of the meat would

freeze while the rest was frying! I put in some fat, and tipped in

four mugs of cut up seal and liver. It took about three-quarters of an

hour to cook, being stirred continuously. I fear me I used my dagger

as poker, cutter of blubber, as scraper of soot, stirrer and taster,

all indiscriminately! However, with onion powder and salt it doesn’t

taste badly, though it makes my teeth ache chewing it. The cooker of

warmed water boiled in no time, though it had been cooling for

three-quarters of an hour, and we had hot cocoa to time. I had only

one biscuit, so that it was a cheap indigenous meal.”

The weather had been rather disagreeable during the last month, about

four days fine alternating with five days overcast. This is not usual

in midsummer, but we chiefly required strong winds to blow away the

sea-ice, so that Pennell could reach us. With a sailor’s superstition

Gran hung up his most dilapidated headgear “for a favouring wind.” He

said it always took effect in twenty-four hours. However, as was often

the case with our sanguine prophet, nothing came of his forecast, and

his stock was flat again.

On the 11th Debenham swore that he saw the _Terra Nova_. Gran

confirmed this, and said the sails were set. I got hold of the

binoculars, and alas! I saw _three Terra Novas_. They were miraged

bergs, I fear. I thought it would be a good plan to have a signal on

top of Discovery Bluff, and so Gran and I carried paper, blubber, and

dried moss, to the summit, and left them there in readiness for a

flare, if the ship approached. I carried up the theodolite, but did

not take many angles, for it began to snow. When I returned, I found

that Forde had kindly done my cooking—or rather greatly improved on

it. He made some excellent chupatties from “thickers” and raisins, of

which we had a small surplus.

That evening we had a great argument about the possibility of a German

invasion, Gran _versus_ Debenham, in which Forde and I took sides to

keep things lively. “We agreed that Germany could not conquer a

colony, even if it _were_ handed over to them; that the Kaiser’s

aspirations ought to be humbled, and that the British officers were

not so highly educated as the German.” Gran had many tales of the vast

amount of linguistic and mathematical knowledge which they amassed.

_Friday the 12th._—No sign of the ship! This is the day I backed for

our meeting. However, my cookery is over for a time.

Gran and I walked over to the Tongue to measure the movement of the

ice. On the 26th of December I had sighted on to the stake with the

theodolite, and obtained a movement of thirty feet in twelve days.

“She is fairly galloping to sea.” On this occasion we both wore spiked

boots, and so had little difficulty on the glacier, though the recent

snow had hidden all but the largest crevasses. On arrival at the

stake—which had not suffered from the blizzards—Gran lay on the snow

with the field glasses, and observed Debenham, who was posted with the

theodolite at the camp station. Meanwhile I moved east or west, and

Debenham signalled to Gran until I stood on the transit with the crack

in the Kar Cliffs. Now I made a direct measurement from this line to

the stake, and found a movement to the east of eighty-two feet.

Therefore the glacier has a velocity of almost a yard a day. The

sketch (Fig., p. 374) shows exactly how this determination—which I

believe to be the most accurate in Victoria Land—was made.

Gran suggested trying another route back, so we moved into one of the

huge gullies (which nearly dissect the Tongue every half-mile) and we

found it remarkably easy. There were three little lakelets between

thirty feet walls, showing there was no drainage into crevasses here,

and we reached the bay ice with great ease.

I discussed pushing off for Cape Roberts instead of waiting close to

the Bluff. There was no possibility of the ship coming in to us, and

we could meet them as easily from the entrance. On the other hand,

there seemed no way out of the _cul-de-sac_ at Cape Geology if the

ship did not arrive, and the sea-ice broke away. So, after talking it

over, I decided to leave our headquarters on the 14th.

On the 13th Debenham and Gran went to the Bluff, and Gran climbed to

the top to scan the ice in Ross Sea. Debenham visited the flag, and

made a chart of the great shear cracks in the bay ice, due to the

Mackay Ice Tongue.

Forde and I packed everything which we should need for sledging at

Evans Coves on the good sledge. We packed the specimens, and some

articles not now necessary on the “roof-tree” sledge. This

necessitated dismantling Granite Hut, and very woe-begone it looked,

with the sealskins flapping dismally on its walls. They had turned

into fine _black_ fur now, but were not beautiful enough to warrant

transport on our heavily laden sledge. The skuas enjoyed our removal.

They pounced eagerly on our specimen bags, and flew off some distance

with several, in the hopes of finding a dainty morsel.

I was much amazed at the unusual sight of two skua gulls amicably

tearing a piece of blubber up between them, and bolting half each. I

never saw another instance of so much sociability.

“On Sunday, January 14, I woke the others at 6 a.m., having had to

keep awake an hour or so to do it. We had food quickly, packed up, and

were ready to start about twenty to eight. I should think our sledge

had 900 lbs. on it, which is about a record down here. We got over our

‘Pressure Pier’ to the bay ice without much difficulty, though it is

very narrow now. Later parties will have to find a new route.

“We found the sledge pretty hard to pull, and it took us over an hour

to do the first mile. When you are going slowly it is always twice as

hard, and lasts twice as long! This looked bad with nine miles to do.

We got over the first tide crack, near the signal flag, by means of an

island. Then we halted for a rest, and marched along the front of the

Bluff towards the Piedmont Ice Tongue. The east was very gloomy now,

and it started to snow. When you are pulling half a ton, and know that

the ice you are on was breaking up in January, 1903, this is not

cheerful. However, I turned in nearer the land, so as to reach

Avalanche Bay, where it was possible to ascend the cliffs. The snow

got no worse, and the surface improved slightly. We could see two

seals far ahead on the next big crack, and we found thirty feet of

wet, mushy snow at the first spot.”

A little searching showed us a possible track. Debenham and I, tied

together, crossed first, and then the others, and then we judged the

sledge might do it. I expect it would have sunk like a stone if the

ice had given way; but we had to get over here, or nowhere.

The snow came down thickly now, and we plugged ahead by compass for

the small Piedmont Tongue, where we had been held up two days on our

arrival. Suddenly we seemed to run into a snow slope, and by a mighty

expenditure of energy we got the sledge up on to the tongue, and were

safely on fixed ice for the time.

We soon got the tent pitched, for there was not much wind, and had

some tea. I will quote my diary.

“We were all in a cold sweat, for the work is very hard, and yet you

don’t keep warm. However, we got into our bags, and were soon warm, if

damp. The blizzard was but temporary, and about 4 p.m. it blew over to

the west. I crossed the Tongue to see the descent on the other side.

It was about five feet down a steep snow slope. Beyond was a narrow

shear crack with two seals; but the big crack at the end of the tongue

went further east. We pulled over the glacier and down the slope past

the seals without difficulty. Then on a little further, and saw a

crack to our right.

“It seemed only about a foot wide, and I was testing this weak spot

with the ski-stick, when the foot of soft snow on which I was standing

collapsed, and I went into the water. Luckily I grabbed Deb’s hand,

and Forde and Gran got my harness. I was jerked out like a cork from a

bottle, and was never so near flying. None saw the others pull, and

they thought I felt very light. We plugged on to the east, and came to

the main wavy crack, an ugly thing, thirty feet across, of mushy

water. Luckily this also narrowed at the bend, and after some

searching we pulled over him also.”

I was getting thoroughly tired here. However, we could see our

destination at last, and so pushed on. A keen wind came up from the

south-west, and swept over the one hundred feet glacier wall to the

south, driving snow across our course. We crossed a little crack which

Debenham thought was new since the snowfall. To our left were many

birds, about a mile away, and black patches of ominous appearance were

showing. Debenham climbed on the sledge, and was sure it was open

water, and I agreed; but we couldn’t do anything, and pushed on. “I

got some relief for my tired legs by marching a longer stride, and we

plugged on, hoping it would hold firm another hour. However, at long

length we began to see details in the never-ending glacier wall on our

left—icicles, crevasses, and snowdrifts,—and at last could make out a

feasible slope up on to the Cape, and felt safe. I had cramp from the

pulling, and couldn’t move for a time.” Then it was a distinct

anticlimax, when we got to the top of the Cape, to see that we had

been misled by some queer shadows, that there was firm ice for at

least seven miles, and no sign of water anywhere! However, our

experience at New Harbour made both Debenham and myself realize the

risk we were running if the break up of the ice, now long overdue, had

eventuated.

“Monday, the 15th January, 1912; the day on which we were to be

relieved. ’Nary a relief, nor any sign of it, and skuas squawking

round us!

“We surveyed our cape expecting to find pools of water in plenty, but

there is none anywhere. Everything is covered with snow except the big

boulders and two or three patches of gravel, of which we have annexed

the largest. When we arrived each gravel patch was inhabited by a pair

of skua gulls, which we may call White, Black, and Gray respectively.”

We dispossessed the Blacks, and I put young “Blackie” in a new

nest—just as well made as his own—a little distance away. Meanwhile

Debenham set up the blubber stove on a rock ledge near by, to get to

which he crossed the Grays’ nest rather frequently.

The chronicle of these three families have been done into rhyme by the

“Sledge Poet,” and will be found to be pathetic in the extreme.

A TRUE ANTARCTIC TRAGEDY

On the Cape by Granite Harbour, where the Glacier shrinks away,

Happy dwelt three pairs of Skuas, fighting gaily night and day.

Skua-_White_ possessed but one egg. Young Skua-_Black_ to walk begins;

Skua-_Gray_ was just expecting the arrival of some Twins!

To that Cape by Granite Harbour stagger in at bright midnight,

Blizzard-blown and Ice-tormented, Four exhausted men of might.

Boulders carpeted their refuge, each within a snowfield set,

Only three inviting tent-sites crowned the Cape ... and they were LET.

Operates the law primeval, “Shove the weaker to the floe.”

Fix the tent there in the middle, Skua Black has got to go.

With a shriek of rage and anguish fled the parents of S. B.

Little cared the callous leader; “Hurry up, and boil the tea.”

By the nest of Skuas grayish, quick was placed the Blubber Stove,

And the incense thence proceeding made the skuas murmur “Jove!”

They _had_ to seek another refuge. Bitter feelings filled their cup.

It tore their hearts to leave their offspring, so they sighed—and ate

them up.

Very loudly yelled young Blackie, crawling round the tent all night,

So that kind and humane leader took him off to Skua White.

“Lo! a miracle hath happened,” said returning Skua White;

“Here’s our nest just _full_ of chicken, full of howling appetite.”

Said Skua White, “It would be best, for fear this should become a

habit,

To feed _ourselves_ upon our _egg_.” (Besides, you may be sure _he’d_

grab it.)

So little Blackie reigned supreme

Until one day when he was fed

(By that kind and humane leader

Foster-father, foster-feeder)

On rich and tasty lumps of blubber,

His little tummy stretched like rubber,

Stretched too much——

and now _HE’s_ dead!

The skuas are the most quarrelsome birds I know. They would fight for

hours over the carcase of a freshly-killed seal until they realized

there was enough food for ten times as many skuas—and by this time the

flesh would be frozen so hard they could make no impression on it. The

penguins have their own peculiar propensities, while the seals used to

amaze us by their callousness. The day after we reached Cape Roberts

we killed a large seal and cut it up, while another twenty yards away

watched us quite casually, and did not budge for hours.

There was nothing much to do on the Cape. It was triangular in shape,

rising about fifty feet above the sea-ice. The broad base of the

triangle was covered with snow, which gradually merged into the

Piedmont Glacier. There was no ice wall here, so that the glacier was

presumably stagnant at this corner. The great granite tors of the Cape

were all flattened, showing that they had been planed off by a former

extension of the ice-sheet. Debenham spent some time making a detailed

plane-table survey. I fixed several theodolite stations, but as the

days went by our life settled into a monotonous round.

I cut the meals down to two a day. We had plenty of seal meat and

biscuit, but all the other stores were approaching their last week.

We used to have a meal about 7 p.m. every other day, a half ration of

pemmican; for although seal meat is not so black as it’s painted (and

it’s very black indeed), yet we had eaten little else for a month, and

were all heartily sick of it. Then we turned in, and used to yarn or

read till about 3 a.m., when we managed to get to sleep. We turned out

at noon, and had a biscuit and seal lunch. During the afternoon we

used to walk over the cape and inspect the cracks in the sea-ice. One

man was kept fairly busy cutting up seal meat, and the cook coaxed the

stove to cook the fry.

Debenham was our only smoker, and certainly found tobacco a great

solace. I had brought socks instead of tobacco, and had looked forward

to jeering at him when his tobacco and socks gave out. Unfortunately

our socks lasted much better this trip, as our boots were stronger,

and I never used my spare socks!

Gran started a drama—a great nature play full of storms and wrecks,

with a strong substratum of melodrama. It was called “Tangholman

Lighthouse,” and we used to urge him to fill it full of incident, and

cut out the “nature” part of it. I read “Martin Chuzzlewit” for the

ninth time and found it, as always, very interesting; while Forde

tackled “Incomparable Bellairs”—a book which charmed Gran—but luckily

Forde made it last a very long time.

We played chess with our cardboard pieces. I think we were fairly

even, though Debenham tried risky openings to my advantage. The place

of Evans as Society Entertainer was taken by Gran. His varied

adventures in Arctic seas, among the Andes, in Turkey, Venezuela, and

others of the less-known regions of the earth interested us much. He

was, I remember, very anxious to experience the delights of station

life as pourtrayed by Debenham.

The 20th of January was Gran’s birthday. I was sorry I couldn’t return

his kindly present (of Savoy sauce, etc.), but I told him I would give

him a ship during the day. The Sledge Poet contributed the following

Birthday Ode, dealing with Gran’s Nietzschian principles; which is

here published with Gran’s gracious permission.

ODE TO TRYGGVE

ON HIS 23RD BIRTHDAY, CAPE ROBERTS.

(Chanted at ye Full Pemmican Feast.)

O Trygge Gran, O Trygge Gran,

I would thou wert a moral man,

And yet since we

(The other three)

Are just as moral as can be,

A “soupçon de diablerie”

Improves our little company.

O Tryggve Gran, a holy calm

Is most essential in a psalm.

But prose should be a thought less calmer

When elevated into drama.

And yet though we

(The other three)

Are critical to a degree,

We wish success some future day

To the first Polar “Nature Play.”

O Tryggve Gran, thou art a man

Who hath compressed within a span

Of three and twenty years, such deeds

That hearing which, each man’s heart bleeds

Among us three.

And yet though _we_

Are kind to every girl we see,

I have no doubt each lovely creature

Would rather help _you_ follow Nietzsche!

Oh, Tryggve Gran, you should be dead

A-many years ago—instead

Of which, he saves you oft,

That “Little Cherub up Aloft.”

And therefore we

(The other three)

In this new principle agree,

(As with your luck no man can quarrel)

’Twill serve us best to be _un-moral_!!!

I was just writing the last line of the poem when Gran yelled out

“Ship ho!” We had seen ships many times already, but he was certain of

this, so we turned out, and there, under the fang of Erebus, we could

see some topmasts. Later we could make out three masts and black

smoke, so we knew it was the good old _Terra Nova_, and not the

_Fram_, which burned smokeless oil fuel.

We set about elevating our flags further up the glacier. We took them

up a long way, nearly to the top, as we thought. On our return we saw

they were only one quarter of the way up, a good example of the

trickiness of snow slopes in this respect. I arranged night watches to

observe any signals or sledge parties, and we turned in hoping to be

aboard in twenty-four hours.

[Nay, gentle reader, you are not at the end of my narrative; it was

just twenty-four days before we were relieved.]

Next day she was in much the same position, about twenty miles away

across the screw-pack and broken floes. About two miles away a great

crack stretched from north and south. It was fully eight miles long,

and seemed to presage the breaking up of the sea-ice.

On the 22nd we could not see the ship. A strong south wind sprang up,

and the gradually clouding sky seemed to portend a blizzard. “The

stronger the better,” I write, “if it will only drive out this blessed

floe.” We took a few photographs. There were two Emperor penguins

moulting on each side of our Cape, but Debenham reported that they

were too frightful to photo! Forde and I had a day with my

stereo-camera, taking various interesting details around the

Cape—planed granite blocks, pressure ice in the bay, and then the

Emperors, awful as they were, several seal and berg pictures, etc.;

but sad to relate all these negatives were smashed when the sledge

fell over the glacier cliff. However, I made sketches of the most

interesting features; for instance, one corner of a berg showed very

well how flexible are large masses of ice.

I did not entertain the idea of trying to reach Pennell across the

screw-pack. We should get into more precarious regions each mile, and

we could not communicate with the ship to ensure her awaiting us.

Pennell could send a party with safety at either end if he desired. I

was, however, very glad later to find that Pennell also considered the

pack absolutely impossible for sledging from the ship.

We saw her during the next few days, and then she never showed up

again.

On the 27th a blizzard started, which we hoped would move out the ice.

It tore our sledge flags badly, so that we brought them down from our

distress signal 350 feet up the glacier, leaving the big depôt flag

there.

It was very trying work with the blubber stove, for there was no

shelter on the Cape. When there was any wind the flames would blow out

of the door and gave no heat at all. The water did not get tepid in

half an hour, whereas on a calm day it would boil in twenty minutes. I

spent an hour trying to cook the fry, and barely succeeded in melting

the fat. We decided that the stove could not be used in high winds,

even though it was in a sort of ice cave and the cook sat in the door

to keep the wind out!

[Illustration: Flexure in 30 pr. Berg, Cape Roberts 20·1·12]

Our rations had been cut down by half for a fortnight. We now had

three or four biscuits a day; butter, every other day; chocolate, one

stick; pemmican, one-eighth; sugar and tea, two-thirds a day. However,

we had plenty of seal meat, and as we were not working we required

much less food.

So passed several days. The tide crack was groaning all round the

Cape, large pieces of floes floating loose in it, and jostling each

other as the swell came in from the open water twenty miles away. Gran

spent all one afternoon making chupatties. The lid of the camera box

was his pudding-board. He used the wheatmeal thickers for dough, and

commandeered our allowance of raisins. The cakes were cut out with the

rim of a cup, and then fried in a mixture of butter, fat, blubber, and

soot. Anyhow, the result was highly successful, though the inside was

somewhat wet, and the whole, I should now consider, distinctly heavy.

Each day we started the last bag of something precious. First the

pemmican, then the chocolate, then the butter. Only one seal had been

visible for some days, and I decreed his doom. He lay on a large piece

of ice which was rising and falling with the swell. We reached this

across an ice island, surging about in a large pool. In spite of all

this movement no more of the ice moved north, as far as we could

judge.

On the evening of the 1st of February I held a council. Captain

Scott’s instructions read, “I am of the opinion that the retreat

should not be commenced until the bays have refrozen, probably towards

the end of March. An attempt to retreat overland might involve you in

difficulties, whereas you could build a stone hut, provision it with

seal meat, and remain in safety in any convenient station on the

coast.”

However, he gave me permission to begin the retreat if we were not

relieved in January, and I began to prepare for this event.

Cracks seemed to be spreading in the sea-ice even while one was

watching it. The surging ice in the tide crack, now twenty feet wide,

rose several feet. Now and again a huge shock-groan, like a big rock

bumping on another, announced a new crack, while a constant roar, like

that of a distant lion, announced the periods of maximum of the swell

rolling in from twenty miles away.

On the 3rd of February Debenham, Gran, and I climbed the glacier slope

behind our camp to prospect for a path. We roped up and proceeded

about three miles southward, keeping well behind the crevasses. These

are numerous on the steep seaward slope, but we met with none on the

fairly level ground, though we could see them just below us. The

surface was fair, usually two inches deep in snow and occasionally a

foot deep. This did not promise easy sledging; but the snow was dry

now, and I was going to cut down the weights to a minimum.

We could see open water about twenty miles off, but a huge mass of

ice-pack was apparent as far north as we could see. There seemed to be

a broad belt at least sixty miles long, which was quite absent in

January, 1902.

Obviously our exploration of Terra Nova Bay was impossible now, and it

looked as if the ship would never reach us at Cape Roberts. With good

luck we might cross the Piedmont Glacier to Cape Bernacchi in a few

days, and Pennell might find it easier to reach us there, while we

should at any rate be nearer to Headquarters. There was also a week’s

food there, and we had now only a fortnight’s sledging stores left.

On February 4th Gran and I explored the sea-ice below the Piedmont for

about four miles to the southward. We passed through the fifteen bergs

in the little bay and then got among the screw-pack. This was covered

with snow and afforded extremely heavy going, as may be imagined. Near

the shore was a perfect network of new cracks with the ice “working”

all the time. Below the glacier wall was a deep tide crack four feet

wide, but where the ice had fallen in we managed to get across to

fixed ice. As a result of this journey I decided to march first along

the sea-ice and then climb up the Piedmont at this point.

Next morning I wrote a long letter to Pennell, which we all signed. We

made a depôt on the highest point of the Cape and fixed a flag

alongside, with the letter in a little matchbox. The journal for

Captain Scott I left in my ditty bag. I remorselessly weeded out every

one’s gear. We took nothing but what we stood up in, and our notes and

the instruments. Luckily, most of Debenham’s and all Gran’s negatives

were films, but I had to leave nearly all my plates and my cherished

Browning. I knew we had some bad crevassed country to traverse—thirty

miles of this, and then I expected thirty miles of coast work largely

over moraine and rock, where we should have to portage the sledge and

all our gear on our backs. With a light sledge it was just possible we

might be able to raise it if it slipped down a crevasse; and this was

quite a probable event, for in traversing along a piedmont glacier the

party moves _parallel_ to the crevasses. It thus reaches them

imperceptibly, and the whole outfit may be over a crevasse together,

whereas in crossing them at right angles this is rarely the case.

We turned our backs finally on Cape Roberts at 11 a.m. on the 5th. Our

flag waved bravely, and below was the cairn of stones covering the

food left there by Scott’s orders. If we had to return it would give

us a breathing space, but I never saw the Cape again. For many months

the flag was left in solitude. The screw-pack never broke adrift that

winter. In the next spring, six desperate men sledging southward, as

they thought, to more endurable though no less solitary quarters, here

found the first news of the main party. Our depôt possibly saved

Browning’s life. It certainly gave the Northern party their first

bearable day for many months. Brave old flag! it hangs in Tewkesbury

in Priestley’s home, and there my old Browning was restored to me

after many months!

So we marched on; we were all stiff and out of training, and the

sledge did not pull easily, but we reached the tide crack and crossed

it much more easily than I expected. After lunch we pulled up the

steep slope of the glacier, and to our delight found the surface grow

harder almost every hour. But other troubles were upon us. For three

days I felt it would not benefit any one to write my diary. However,

on the evening of the 8th I wrote up the 5th, 6th, 7th, and 8th of

February as follows:—

“Then quite suddenly we came on huge crevasses all round; some open,

which I took care not to keep too close to, and others bridged. They

seemed too wide to do anything with; but after cautioning the others

to tread quietly, I prodded across safely, though the ice-axe pushed

in all its length easily. Then the others followed, and the sledge

after. Gran fell in at the near edge and saw the straight wall.

Several of these were over twenty feet wide, but we had to chance

them, and tested them all before the sledge started. Then we marched

along between two fairly visible ones, and luckily they didn’t join.

The surface got flatter and they died out gradually so that we made

fair progress. We came to another enclosed snow basin, and I felt sure

the seaward slope would be safer. So it was, though Forde went down a

small crevasse. We pulled along this up to a sort of col—about eight

miles from Cape Roberts,—and here, as we were well beyond the mouth of

the Big Valley, we camped.

“My only fear now was that bad weather might cover the glacier with

soft snow, for I felt that all the big crevasses would be lidded, and

the little ones could hardly swallow the lot of us.”

Next morning we made the harness traces longer, so that only one man

at a time need cross even a wide crevasse. We had to traverse the

mouth of another large valley glacier. Three of these debouched on the

Piedmont Glacier from the western mountains, and the pressure from the

northernmost (the Debenham Glacier) was responsible for the crevasses

of the 5th of March. The second valley glacier was not so large, but

we anticipated trouble. We had a stiff pull uphill for three-quarters

of a mile, but some of the snow was so hard that the sledge runners

made no mark. This was an ideal surface, for one’s feet did not slip

on it, though occasionally the sledge skidded. We were about seven

hundred feet above the sea here, and entered a col just below a huge

snow hill.

“Afterwards we were cutting around the hill aforesaid, when suddenly

appeared many crevasses. So we deviated abruptly and ascended sharply.

We encountered three, into one of which I fell, but they were not very

wide. The moral of this is—Don’t go for the break of a hill facing and

near the sea, but stick to humdrum grades if possible; if not, still

don’t go for the break of a hill!”

The somewhat frivolous tone of the above note is evidence that it was

written when we had traversed the worst of the Piedmont. It was always

the case “down South.” One never got photographs or “instantaneous

pen-pictures” of anything really exciting. It was always a case of

“Get a move on, and get out of this good and quick,” so that one’s

diary lost most where it would have been most interesting.

We were now behind Dunlop Island, and about 1250 feet up the Piedmont.

We were astonished to find that the floe had all broken up to

south’ard. Long curved cracks parallel to the coast marked where

pieces were continually floating off. We congratulated ourselves on

our safe position on the Piedmont, for we should have sledged into

this without knowing it had we continued much further on the sea-ice.

Small bergs looking just like white yachts dotted the open water,

which seemed to extend south to Castle Rock. There was no sign of the

_Terra Nova_. We began to think she had come to grief, for Pennell

knew we were free to move off on the 1st of February.

After supper Debenham got out his plane-table and continued his

survey. He was much puzzled by the position of his station on the

stranded Glacier Tongue to the south-east. He realized soon, however,

that it had twisted round, and was even now preparing to continue its

journey to the Nirvana of warm northern waters.

We had been blessed with sunshine the last few days. I don’t believe

we should have managed to dodge the crevasses otherwise, for in dull

weather you cannot tell any difference between a ten-foot hollow or a

ten-foot hummock when it is only a yard or two away. However, as a

result, Forde got a bad touch of snow-blindness. Debenham got out the

medical chest. He ground up some ZnSO_{4}, picked it up on a

paintbrush, and dropped it in the corner of Forde’s eye. Later in the

night I gave Forde another dose, for the pain is pretty considerable.

The next day my right eye was sore and watering, in spite of the amber

glasses, and I feared I was to become a patient also. We plugged along

over an absolutely level snow-plain, when Debenham dropped into a

crevasse, over which I had crossed without puncturing the lid.

In the afternoon my eyes gave out, and I put on bandages on the right

eye, and gave up the lead to Debenham. It was an astonishing relief to

cease from staring at the glaring surface, and either pull along with

shut eyes or keep one eye on the gratefully dirty back of Debenham’s

jacket.

Debenham led us safely past three huge crevasses, and we halted for a

spell among a cluster of smaller ones. That evening we climbed up the

snow hill behind Gneiss Point, about 1350 feet above the sea; and as

we had now passed the third valley glacier, I felt we had finished

with the crevasses for the time being. We camped on hard snow, and

Debenham treated me for snow-blindness. The zinc sulphate may

truthfully be described as an eye-opener, but later the cocaine in the

mixture calms things down. You are advised “to keep your face cool.”

But I had to keep my head in the bag to get warm. However, Forde was

pretty right next day, and mine had stopped aching, though everything

appeared double for many hours!

On the 8th we reached the land near Cape Bernacchi. There was a steep

ice slope two hundred feet high, at an angle of 30°. Luckily it was

much honeycombed and sun-eaten. We put grummets (rope brakes) on the

sledge, and managed to get it down about 130 feet. We had a very

cheerful lunch, for we knew the depôt was only a few miles south. Then

we found an ice-foot all the way along the edge of the rocks and

moraine which led us right to the Bernacchi cairn. This was a regular

ice pathway about twenty yards wide. It was due to sea-ice which had

become cemented to the shore, the tide crack being further away from

the rocks, and defining that part of the floe which had lately drifted

away to sea.

No one had visited our depôt. New Harbour was full of new broken floe,

but a fine ice-foot seemed to promise well for our next march.

We stayed a day at Cape Bernacchi, for I wished to get a good station

for the triangulation of this coast. Gran and I took the theodolite to

the top of a hill 2900 feet high, at the north-east end of Dry Valley.

We named this Hjort’s Hill, in honour of the maker of our trusty

Primus lamp. As we were climbing this hill, Gran swore he could see

the ship off Cape Evans through the binoculars. It seemed clear to me

also—smoke, crosstrees, hull, and three masts; but after an hour or so

we decided it was only a mirage crack in the Barne Glacier. The

disappointment was rather keen, though I am now not so sure that we

did not really see the ship, some forty miles away. We could see the

forty-foot debris cones behind the hut quite easily on a clear day.

I wrote the usual letter to Pennell. I had left two in Granite Harbour

and two on the Piedmont now, and it did not look as if any would ever

be read.

All through the 10th we skirted New Harbour, finding a fairly feasible

ice-foot between the granite-strewn slopes and the open water. We came

across a Spratt’s biscuit box here, which was evidently left by the

1902 expedition. We saved a considerable detour by crossing the head

of the harbour on the sea-ice, and camped below the Kukri Hills, where

I halted rather early to get a round of angles. We were held up here

all next day by the snow, which we spent reading and sewing.

On the 12th we rounded the Kukri Hills, and when the ice-foot petered

out we were luckily able to continue on the sea-ice. We had lunch amid

a colony of over forty seals, and then reached the southern side of

the Ferrar Glacier, where we camped on a rather wet and muddy heap of

“road metal” moraine.

We were now safely round New Harbour, and, curiously enough, crossed

the sea-ice at the mouth of the Ferrar on the same day of the year as

when we nearly went out to sea on our first sledge journey.

Henceforward we knew our route. We had plenty of food at the Butter

Point depôt, which we reached that evening, and knew we could reach

the old _Discovery_ hut before the end of the month.

The depôt had been blown over and wrecked generally. We took some

pemmican, butter, and chocolate, and next day proceeded south along

the Butter Point Piedmont. The surface was much better than the

preceding year, but, curiously enough, we found quite a number of

small crevasses. Debenham and Forde fell in together in one of these,

and the burly Irishman jammed so tightly it was quite a business

pulling him out of it. In the evening we reached the Strand Moraines.

These are great piles of ancient silt, gravel, and erratic blocks,

which were dropped here by the ancestor of the present Koettlitz

Glacier.

At the southern end of these moraines, which were several miles long,

was quite a large lake. We tobogganed down to this and across to a

nice little gravelly delta just made for the tent. We found that the

open water reached just to this point, the sound still being frozen to

south’ard, though obviously breaking away in great sheets. I wrote

that night, “No _Terra Nova_. We should be picked up at Evans Coves

(Terra Nova Bay) to-morrow!” We had the choice of two routes now:

either to cross the snout of the Blue Glacier, or to take to the

sea-ice and coast round the latter. We had done the former and knew it

would only take a day. The latter might be quicker, though a great

calved berg blocked the route about two miles ahead. Debenham

preferred the glacier, the other two the sea-ice. I considered it

unsafe to march on the sea-ice if it could possibly be avoided. I made

a bet with Gran that we couldn’t get the sledge between the calved

berg and the glacier without unloading it. This had a rather

interesting outcome. I decided to keep to land ice, on the principle

of the “Devil you know being preferable to the Devil you don’t.”

[Illustration:

THE RUSH TO SAFETY: OVER THE EDGE OF THE BLUE GLACIER.

From a drawing by D. Low.

]

It was annoying to find that the Blue Glacier had so completely

changed its complexion in the twelve months. In place of clear blue

ice where one could see every crevasse, it was one uniform sheet of

smooth snow, and we soon began to fall into the crevasses. In a very

short time we had all been in a couple of times, and it was evidently

an unpropitious region for sledging. I deviated to the edge of the

glacier to try and lower the sledge on to the sea-ice, for we were now

abreast of the calved berg, where we halted a few minutes.

Away to the south-east we could see a blizzard brewing, and I wanted

to get a snug camp in the gullies south of the Blue Glacier. We had an

argument as to who had won the bet, for there was a jumble of ice

where the calf jammed the parent glacier. The other two decided in my

favour, and so we pushed off on the top of the glacier edge to the

wished-for camp. Gran was dissatisfied with the court’s decision, and

kept glancing back to the scene under discussion. Just as we were

dipping down the slope he yelled out “Ship ho!” and there she was over

the top of the black moraines.

We turned back at full speed to retraverse the crevasses, for she was

four miles off and we were afraid might miss us, as a snowstorm was

brewing in the east. She steamed along past the berg and out along the

floe. We pulled back hard, crossing crevasses carelessly, but not

falling in much, and finally could make out that she had a flag on the

gaff, apparently recognizing us. We kept along the edge of the glacier

till we could find a place to get down. Here was a drop of thirty feet

almost vertical with a big tide crack and a tide-pool at the bottom!

Gran went down first, and then I got down halfway. Unluckily as we

were lowering the sledge Forde was pulled over by his harness and fell

right on to Gran, who was pressed into the snow while the sledge came

down on top of us. It nearly broke in the middle; however, we lugged

it over to the ice and set off hot-foot over the two miles of ice. The

ship now anchored near the floe and four men came to meet us. They

harnessed up and told us the news. We heard that the Southern party

were going very well, that there were no signs of Amundsen, and that

there had been no accidents of importance. Also that they had not been

able to communicate with Cape Evans until a week before, and had been

unloading stores every available moment before they came over to

search for us. And then the world’s news made us feel safer in the

Antarctic at first hearing: the disruption of China, the

Franco-German-English trouble in Morocco, the Italians and Turks in

Tripoli, and the great strikes in England. We had missed an eventful

year during our sojourn in the peaceful regions of the South.

VII

THE VOYAGE BACK

FEBRUARY–MARCH, 1912

[Illustration:

Return voyage of the _Terra Nova_ in March, 1912, showing pack-ice off

Evans Coves and Granite Harbour and the dominant winds determining

the ship’s course.

]

THE VOYAGE BACK

What does it feel like to be in touch with civilization after a year’s

absence? Man is an ungrateful creature, and I can remember what we

missed, better than what we gained on reaching the _Terra Nova_.

However, the letters were there. They had been put ready for us in the

wardroom. No small bag would suffice, our literary matter ran to

pillow-slips. I had one well filled, and Debenham, lucky beggar, had

two! Poor Gran’s home mail failed to reach him, and he had only a few

bills, which he could have spared. I rapidly skimmed through all the

news and then opened up the packets. One young soldier friend sent

along a huge gift of pipes and tobacco. Said he, “I know you didn’t

smoke, but I expect you’ve learnt to! Anyhow they’ll be useful.” They

truly were most acceptable, and were most prized by the party

remaining. To balance this gift he sent along “The Geology of

Nigeria.”

After the first glance through, however, I turned to more pressing

needs. Clean clothes and a bath seemed the greatest treat one could

wish to enjoy.

Two factors blocked us. All our clean clothes were on land, some in

our own hut, some in the Old Discovery Hut! Moreover, Ponting came

along and after complimenting us on our villainous appearance, begged

us to remain picturesque until the sun showed enough light for a

photograph! Luckily we had only to wait a few hours for this specimen

of “ponting”; and after four months a day’s more or less grime

mattered little.

One disappointment we met with. Our first cry was “Letters,” and our

second “Fruit.” Drake sympathized with us and said that all fruit

except apples had been landed at the hut a week ago. However a box of

apples had been reserved for the Western Party. We rushed that box.

The apples were icy cold and frozen solid. Eagerly we placed some on

the top of the wardroom stove. We waited until they were well warmed

and then voraciously bit into them, to encounter a stony iceberg in

the middle! They took an incredible time to thaw, and then all the

plant cells had burst, and the apple was a poor thing all brown and

almost rotten!

In my cabin I found a small tin trunk with better fare: cakes, sweets

and nuts of all descriptions, everything but chocolate. After hearing

the yarns of some of Shackleton’s men, I expected to be surfeited with

chocolate, and so warned my people not to send any down by the ship.

However, the other luxuries were well-chosen and abundant. Every

officer aboard had selections each day, and not till we reached the

Circle nearly a month later was that tin box depleted. Indeed, one

cake from Parramatta friends was so large that a half was sent to

gratify the mess deck!

When I was free from Ponting I bolted into the engine-room and was

provided with a huge bucket of scalding water. Rennick and other

officers had lent me some clothes, and I can still remember that bath.

The only available space was over the boilers! I was jammed into a

narrow passage next the ship’s timbers. If one bare foot slipped an

inch too far it touched the boiler plates; if the ship gave a lurch I

cannoned against huge baulks of oak. Still, I started as a toil-worn

and wild-eyed refugee and finished a semi-respectable roustabout!

Pennell soon gave up all hope of reaching Cape Evans. The blizzard

which was brewing at noon, on the 14th, soon enveloped us, and we were

driven far north. Under these circumstances he deemed it advisable to

make the best of it, and proceed to Evans Coves to try and rescue

Campbell’s party.

Among my mail I found a book sent by Professor David. This was

“Queed,” by Harrison, a writer new to me. This novel fairly gripped

me, and I turned into my bunk all standing, and read until I had

finished it. I hope all Mr. Harrison’s readers derived as much

pleasure from it.

“Jim” Dennistoun was a welcome addition to our mess. He had been eager

to see Antarctica in any capacity, and so came along as mule-overseer.

His remuneration was “all found, and one shilling a month.” We often

used to discuss what he would do with the treasure accruing to him

when he was paid off! An ashtray, beaten out of the four-shilling

piece, was the memento he favoured.

But it was fairly uncomfortable on board. It was now very cold, and

the sun rarely showed for long. Spray was driven over us, and froze

where it fell, so that we spent hours chipping the decks free from

some of the icy layer. The wardroom seemed all doors, and draughts

assailed us everywhere. As usual, on approaching civilization, the

Antarctickers contracted influenza. Debenham was really quite ill, and

I had a fearful attack of neuralgia, which lasted a fortnight, due to

a gaping tooth. We used to think of our snug little tent on terra

firma, and after a week of storm at sea decided that we were sorry we

had been picked up by the trusty whaler. Such is man’s ingratitude.

_February 23rd._—We spent a most forlorn day. The ship absolutely

jammed in _new_ ice, formed of pancakes only three or four inches

thick, but gummy, not brittle (so that the ship couldn’t break

through). These were formed of still smaller cakes, cemented together.

I was sure they had grown _in situ_, perhaps in the lee of a huge

piece of pack which had drifted off.

This was very serious, for every hour increased the risk of our being

frozen in, and this was obviously still more probable when we returned

to Cape Evans than in our present position, so much further north.

However, very suddenly the soggy ice was broken by long leads—lying

rather far apart—and we managed to push and butt our way considerably

to the east.

I was down below when I heard the ominous “three whistles,” which

signifies “all hands on deck.” However, in this case it was a call to

“rock ship.” We all lined up at the port bulwarks, in the waist of the

ship. Then Bruce gave the word, and we “set to partners” across the

hatches, and through the narrow spaces to the starboard side. The ship

swung very slightly in consequence. Bruce timed its swing, and then we

all ran back in unison. This time the swing was a little larger. So by

degrees the ship became a self-acting pendulum, and gradually rocked

herself free from the close embrace of the ice. At the same time the

propeller revolved about 1½ times the normal speed, and the ship began

to give a little, and finally went astern. Then more butting, and a

jam or two, and finally we got into looser pancake, where she could do

four knots.

Emperor penguins were interested spectators of our manœuvres, while

the distant coast-line was really of great interest when we had time

to observe it. Mount Melbourne was a finer sight than Erebus, for its

cone was more symmetrical, recalling that of Etna. Mount Nansen,

further south-west, was a huge, flattened scarp, resembling Mount

Lister.

On the 24th we emerged again from the pack to be greeted with a pretty

stiff wind. We steamed south to try and communicate with headquarters.

Lillie told me of some of his results. He believed he could apply the

teachings of Mendelism to the question of colour in half-caste Maoris.

He had made some large collections of fossil plants in New Zealand,

and had dredged up enough of the rare tunicate _Cephalodiscus_ (a

primitive sessile early vertebrate) to supply every museum in the

world! I found out that my thousand insects were probably

_Gomphocephalus_, of which previously only a few odd heads and legs

had been collected in specimens of Antarctic moss.

We got back to the Sound off Cape Evans about noon on the 25th. A

howling gale was blowing so much frost smoke into our teeth that we

could only just see Inaccessible Isle, now covered with a pall of

snow. We manœuvred in North Bay with the 120-foot wall of the Barne

Glacier looming very close. There was a touch of east in the blizzard,

so that the glacier was not quite on our lee. Pennell dropped anchor

when the soundings showed twenty-five fathoms, but we drifted back

quickly, and when we reached fifty fathoms (three hundred feet) the

anchor dragged.

[Illustration:

ENGINEER WILLIAMS AT THE WINCH.

]

[Illustration:

BERNARD DAY ON THE CAPSTAN.

]

We had an awful job hauling up the anchor! Whenever I hear the phrase

“Merrily round the capstan, boys,” I think of that weary time in North

Bay. Each capstan bar had two and sometimes three men pushing it

round. The foc’sle deck was iced over, and even a layer of ashes

afforded little grip, for the blizzard heeled the vessel over, till

the deck sloped like a roof. They tried to help the capstan by a chain

to the steam winch, but the latter ‘took charge’ and nearly flung Bill

Heald off the foc’sle! There was precious little room between the

capstan bars and the rails, and I got jammed, and received a nasty

bruise on the leg. Awful stiff on one’s hands, and on the calf

muscles—like pushing for hours in a football scrum! Pawls (or stops)

prevented the capstan from releasing the chain. Clink ... clank,

clink ... clank; these pawls would sound every minute or so, and then

we had to rest. Each clink meant only an inch or two of cable, and we

had to haul in three hundred feet! When the ship twisted, and the

cable lay along the side of the vessel, it was impossible to raise the

anchor an inch. Finally the anchor caught a firm hold on the third

attempt, about 7 p.m., and we lay steady with ninety fathoms out. The

gale increased, and we all turned in to try and get some rest, and be

ready to land if it lulled. At 11 p.m. Pennell roused us, and I got

into the whaleboat. Bruce was in charge, and I rowed three. We were

less than half a mile from the shore, and found the lee of the cape

quite calm. So I reached the hut, after five months’ absence. It was

eleven days since we had been picked up, all but a few hours, and this

was the first opportunity of communicating with our headquarters.

I stumbled up the shore, nearly waist-deep in snow, where in the

preceding March there was hardly any! We found them all asleep, and by

no means ready to come off! Simpson and Day were soon dressed. I had,

luckily, left all my gear packed in November, and I hauled my boxes

down to the ice-foot. Simpson, Day, Anton, and I returned, and after

some bumping against the ice-ridged quarter of the _Terra Nova_ we got

safely aboard.

The gale began again, and all access to the shore was blocked. Simpson

and I yarned till 5 a.m. He told me that Hooper and Day had reached

the Hut on December 21st from the Barrier. They had found their

four-man sledge too heavy, and having no suitable tool had burnt it in

half with the Primus lamp! They had been caught in a blizzard, and had

marched blindly north in the ensuing thick weather. Later, they saw

their tracks led right between two parallel crevasses, either of which

would have engulfed them!

Next day we could not bring off Meares, Clissold, and Forde. Archer

had gone ashore, so that the ship was now without a cook! The wind was

fairly shrieking, and at 10 a.m. the anchor dragged.

We spent a most wretched day trying to get it up. Not a budge out of

it, though you burst a blood-vessel! The seamen couldn’t say (as

before) that this was due to work on a Sunday. We found that a cog had

broken in the gears of the capstan; but when they again tried the

steam winch to aid the capstan it stripped off more teeth!

[Illustration:

Diagram illustrating the way we managed to “raise anchor” by “luff

upon luff,” February 26, 1912.

]

Another method was tried in the afternoon, which was very slow, but

not so spendthrift of human energy. It was called “luff upon luff,”

and depended purely on a series of pulleys; whereby a small amount of

force at one end of the rope can slowly move a great weight at the

other. The capstan was now practically useless. So the small steam

winch was connected to a set of heavy pulleys (a “five-ply purchase,”

I believe, is the nautical term) to which a claw hook was attached.

This was hooked into the anchor chain, at the hawse hole, inside the

dark foc’sle. I was halfway man, and it was my duty to yell to the

engineer at the winch, as Bruce advised me he was ready. Another yell

meant that the purchase had done its part, and then Rennick put the

capstan brake on (which would still hold, luckily), and the claw hook

was taken off, and attached some links nearer the anchor. By 6 p.m. we

had raised anchor. It came up as bright as silver, and with the

crossbar (stock) broken clean off!

All this time we were drifting to the north-west, and had to keep up

steam to hold her from yawing, and to try and keep the cable from

“binding” on the side of the ship. Throughout the 27th we were nosing

up against the fixed ice off Castle Rock, trying to shelter from the

blizzard. By noon, on the 28th, the blizzard dropped enough for us to

lie alongside Glacier Tongue. At 3 p.m. the ice anchors held, and it

was possible to get ashore, and start “icing ship,” for the tanks were

nearly empty. We had to lie bow on, and get the ice in by a basket

slung from the foreyard. A very slow and laborious business; it took

us six hours to get 4½ tons of ice aboard.

[Illustration: Method of fixing Ice Anchor 28–2–12]

We then moved off to Hut Point, where we landed some stores and

newspapers for the Pole Party if they should be isolated from Cape

Evans, as we had been in April, 1911. Here I met Wright again. We

learnt that Evans was very seriously ill with scurvy. They wrapped him

up in his sleeping-bag and, dragging him to the ice edge, brought him

aboard in the ship’s boat. We let down ropes to the seamen below, and

they lashed him safely, and he was hauled up, looking more like a

corpse than a live man. However, he could speak cheerfully enough, as

usual!

We returned post haste to our hut to take advantage of the unusually

calm weather. We unloaded more stores—chiefly fodder, coal, mutton,

and dog biscuits, and then moved north immediately to make a second

try for Campbell at Evans Coves (lat. 75° S.). Day, Dennistoun, and I

spent the morning of the 1st of March shifting cargo. Indeed, we

seemed to spend a large part of our time during the ensuing month in

that abode of gloom—the empty hold of the _Terra Nova_!

At 10 p.m. we were about fifteen miles from Cape Washington, in very

heavy pancake ice, with a slight swell. There was a thick ice-mush

between the blocks, and this jammed the propeller. For about ten

minutes the engine could not move the shaft. They managed to prise the

ice away finally by poking rods down the rudder post. The grinding and

bumping of the blades on the ice was physically painful. It jarred

one’s whole system just like having a tooth out. The shock to the

propeller, mainshaft, and engine must have been enormous. Luckily our

propeller was four times the usual size for a ship of our tonnage; but

Williams thinks the main shaft might go quite easily, and then we

should be in a mess!

“_2nd March._—During the morning we skirted the pack southward, doing

a sort of ‘blanket-stitch’ course in a vain endeavour to find a

passage through to Campbell.”

Dr. Atkinson was on board attending to Evans, who was unable to move

from his bunk until the day we reached New Zealand (2nd April). We had

again to give up hope of rescuing Campbell, and turned south to land

Atkinson. At 9.30 p.m. we were about thirty miles S.E. of the

Drygalski Tongue, and soon had to heave-to on account of bad weather.

But in the afternoon of the 3rd the wind dropped, and in about ten

minutes the sea was frozen over!

However, this time we reached the Cape fairly readily, and when I woke

on the morning of the 4th I found that we were off the Hut and that a

boat was going to fetch Keohane. He and Atkinson were then landed at

Hut Point, and we had to ice ship again at Glacier Tongue.

Every man was busily employed. Heald, McCarthy, Parsons, and Cheetham

quarried the ice at the nearest spot where it seemed solid and free

from snow. They filled baskets which Dennistoun, Leese, and myself

pulled to the ice edge. Here Simpson and Rennick linked the baskets on

to the rope, and Lillie, Drake, and Ponting hauled it aboard. Day and

Mather carried it to the tanks, and Meares and Bruce tipped the

baskets into the latter. It was hard work, and kept us going from 3

p.m. till 10 p.m. Still there was some fun at times. Leese harnessed

the brown sledge dog Tsigan to help him with his sledge, and Tsigan

occasionally bolted over the glacier. One basket fell into the sea,

and Bill Heald lowered me on a rope till I could grab it; then (as

usual) he hauled up too quickly, and I was dragged _through_ the snow

cornice and pretty well filled with soft snow!

“We shifted eleven tons, and now Pennell’s notice[10] can be

withdrawn. We now have enough to get back. Thank goodness!”

We had a fairly uncomfortable time on board. The stove below was

faulty, and a change of wind filled the wardroom with smoke. With a

huge skylight, various hatchways and companion ladders, and numerous

portholes, it was hopeless to keep out of draughts.

Early on the 7th I was awakened by the fiendish clamour which the

propeller was making about a foot under my bunk! “I found that we were

held up in a hole about twice the size of the ship in heavy fixed

pancake. We were over two hours alternately advancing, sticking,

putting on more steam, reversing, and getting out. All the time huge

blocks of ice were being churned round and battered by the propeller.

We had been heading about N.E. when the ship struck, and in next watch

we had to turn round and retreat as we had come. We were now about

forty miles east of Mount Melbourne.

“She would steam steady for about ten minutes and delude one into

going on deck to see our progress, and we were still in the same

ice-hole! Then we would reverse with more regular vibrations, then

catch a huge bit of ice in the blades, and it would feel as if you

were having three teeth out yourself!”

At noon Pennell abandoned hope of getting near Campbell. At each

attempt the ice was thicker and wider. Each time we got into worse

positions and spent longer in extricating ourselves. “We are later

than any former ship, not allowing for the extraordinary icebound

conditions, this autumn.” So we turned homeward on the 7th March, and

headed for Cape Adare.

On this voyage the ship was in charge of Lieutenant Pennell, while

Rennick and Bruce were the other officers, assisted by Cheetham and

Engineer Williams. Lillie carried on his biological work, while Drake

was busy as ever with secretarial duties, varied by readings of the

meteorological instruments.

We had left the rest of the Western Party at Cape Evans, while

Atkinson and Keohane were stationed at the Old Discovery Hut to

receive the Pole Party.

The members of the headquarters staff who returned to take up other

duties were Simpson, Taylor, Ponting, Meares, and Day. With the

addition of Lieutenant Evans, who was at first seriously affected by

scurvy, and Jim Dennistoun (of New Zealand), we formed a very happy

family during the month of “wind-jamming” which now awaited us.

This was Jim Dennistoun’s birthday, and to celebrate it and our start

for home, I brought out the huge cake sent down from home. Half went

forward to the mess deck, and it was much appreciated. We had a

sing-song with banjo accompaniment by Ponting and Bruce, both of whom

could sing pleasantly. Alf Cheetham gave us some typical sailor

chanties in his humorous falsetto voice. Neuralgia kept me from adding

to the entertainment, and I listened from the after cabin.

During the next few days the afterguard were glad to get warm either

coal-trimming or hauling sails. We would be shivering in the wardroom

when Pennell would come to the “balcony” and yell, “Any volunteers to

trim coal?” Dennistoun was shipped as mule-overseer for the voyage

down, and there was apparently a moral obligation that he should earn

his shilling a week on the return by trimming coal! So he always

turned out and climbed into the bunkers. We followed suit after a few

days’ rest, and worked away in the hold and in the warmer dusty

“bunkers” next the boilers. Then another naval “tyrant” would look

down at the coal trimmers and yell, “All hands on deck to haul

mainsail!” We were true sailor-men in that a chorus of anathemas

saluted our naval colleague! However, we’d go upon deck and get into

oilskins and sou’-westers, and then search out the special halyard in

question, usually finding that the operation had been concluded some

minutes previously!

With two Liberal Socialists like Simpson and myself, it is not to be

supposed that this continued long! We went on strike and delivered our

ultimatum—

“Either coal-trimming or sail-hauling—but not both.” Pennell grinned

cheerfully, and said we could do all the coal-trimming if we liked.

Personally I felt this was more scientific, as touching the

departments of statics and applied mechanics as well as geology! So we

decided to shift all the coal and so leave the engineers and stokers

free to attend to the furnaces where they were somewhat shorthanded.

Never was such an incongruous set of coal trimmers.

[Illustration:

Trimming coal in the starboard main hold, March 7, 1912.

]

Down in the hold a high official in the Indian Weather Service

shovelled the coal into baskets, assisted by our motor expert (Day). A

Cambridge M.A. (and the authority on whales) hoisted the basket with

the help of a well-known New Zealand climber and stockowner. Ponting

bent his artistic intellect to the work of unhooking the basket and

throwing the coal through a door into the bunkers, and inside a

Thibetan explorer and the Physiographer to the Commonwealth “trimmed”

the coal in the bunkers, packed it, and raked it level!

Simpson and I were busy comparing meteorological data before he took

his notes back to India. I copied such memoranda as seemed to affect

Australian weather. The “upper air” results were very interesting. The

balloon ascents showed that there is a gradual decrease of temperature

with elevation in summer, but that in winter it grows warmer. Thus

there is a tendency to approach the same temperature in winter and

summer at high elevations. He recovered one record which had ascended

nearly twice as high as Erebus, or five miles.

Priestley’s log for the Northern Party showed that we at Cape Evans

had been having calms while they, at Cape Adare, had experienced a

twelve-days’ hurricane!

One morning I visited the scene of the pump’s disaster of December,

1910. There is a wooden shaft enclosing the two pump tubes and just

large enough to enable a man to climb down a ladder at one side. It

reached the bilge, and here the pump tubes dipped into the latter.

Before the gale it was only possible to get into the shaft by the main

hatchway. We inspected it by a lighted matchbox, for the electric lamp

was out of order. Under the main deck and at the side of the

engine-room was the hole[11] cut through the iron bulkhead during the

great gale February 12, 1910, and then the pump shaft was entered by

tearing off the side boards at Y. For it was impossible to raise the

hatches and enter in the ordinary way. Now the nozzles were made

removable, and the entry from the engine-room was kept clear, so that

the same danger could not recur. The sounding rod was let down a tube

in one corner of this well also.

On the 7th the temperature had been +7°, and now five days later we

reached freezing-point (32°). Thus the weather was about 5° warmer for

each day’s run north.

“_12th March._—I had a queer dream about the School of Geology at

Sydney, which was quite consistent, and ended with some one going out

and banging the door violently.... So violently that I awoke—to find

the rudder nearly banging itself off with the heavy swell. It is funny

how the sleeping mind adapts itself to real sounds!

“There was no wind, but we had most awful rolling, 41° from the

vertical, so that the swinging lamp in my cabin is nearly lying on its

side. My books sling off the shelves, my boxes come adrift, I was

tossed across the cabin, and all the plates, etc., on the tables jump

right over the fiddles! When we turned in I couldn’t keep still,

though jammed by my knees, toes, back, and head. I stuck in a

drawing-board to prevent my being flung out, and got no sleep, but a

stiff neck through using it as a strut.”

[Illustration:

A. B. CHEETHAM, WHO HOLDS THE RECORD FOR CROSSING THE ANTARCTIC

CIRCLE.

]

[Illustration:

G. C. SIMPSON, MARCH, 1902.

]

Simpson amused us with some early recollections of Sunday schools.

“How did Absalom die?” Loud chorus from the afterguard, “Caught by his

hair and hanged.” Simpson, “The Bible doesn’t say so!” “Who was the

oldest man?” _Frantic_ chorus by aforesaid, “Methusaleh.” _Simpson_,

“No, Enoch, _his_ father, because Methusaleh died before he did!” Then

Simpson quoted an essay by one school. “Moses’ mother was very cruel,

and she put him in the bulrushes, when she got sick of beating him.”

Asked to explain this the boy said, “Well, isn’t that what the Bible

says—when she could _hide_ him no longer?”

During the next few days we were busy writing the cables for the

Associated Press, and I got Drake to type a report of the last western

journey for Captain Scott (which he never saw). The hard-worked

afterguard were now set to wash the wardroom! On the 15th I note—

“Day, Meares, and Dennistoun are doing a bit of charing. This morning

Meares dropped a rag on me as I was working below and missed. Then

Dennistoun asked me to pick it up, and as I looked up, got me in the

eye. So I went for him, and scrubbed his face muchly with soft soap,

amid hilarity.”

At noon on the 16th we passed the Balleny Isles. We could see Buckle

Island about thirty miles to the south as a snow-covered mountain

occasionally showing through the clouds. Only one or two ships have

been so close to these islands since they were charted by Balleny. We

crossed the circle that evening, and celebrated it by another

sing-song. Most of us sang something, Ponting’s contribution with its

refrain of “Boil—my mother” (a study in wrong punctuation) bringing

down the house!

Very early on the 17th every one on deck was busy furling sail when

MacCarthy suddenly spotted an iceberg dead ahead. Luckily we just had

time to steer clear. We had been having “iceberg watch” for some time

now. I had been on duty from 12 to 2 a.m., though I could see nothing

through the snow. The ship was going about five knots, and the white

spume spreading from the bows was about all that was visible. A berg

shows up merely as a greyish cloud under these circumstances.

There were many visible during daytime. At noon, for instance, we

passed another much weathered, and resembling a decayed molar tooth.

Possibly this resemblance is based on similar causes—a hardened outer

skin cemented by spray, etc., and a softer core weathering from above.

I went on iceberg watch again from 8 p.m. till 10. There was some snow

again, and it was difficult to see anything. All this week we had been

driving to the west, so as to pick up the constant west winds and sail

on a slant up to New Zealand. We had only forty-seven tons of coal

left now, and if we got blown past New Zealand with no coal—as was

quite probable—it would take weeks for this bluff old whaler to beat

back against head winds.

Poor old Nigger has gone overboard, finally we fear. We were all proud

of our black Tom. He fell overboard on the last voyage, and luckily

was seen manfully (or catfully?) swimming along in the wake of the

ship. The crew got out a boat, saved him, and were back in twelve

minutes! But no one saw the last tragedy. In the hold we found two

rabbits having a thin time, and fed them on carrots and bread and

milk. I don’t know their ultimate fate. (There’s a black welcome for

bunnies in Australia, which I thought extended to New Zealand also.)

I can see the afterguard becoming regular sailor-men! On the 20th we

had another mutiny—about food this time.

_The Mutineers._ “When are you going to give us a change from this

everlasting mutton, Frankie?”

_Store-keeper Drake._ “Mutton’s very good food.”

_Mutineers._ “Why can’t we have ‘True-egg’ omelettes?”

_Drake._ “Well, perhaps we could have that as an additional dish.”

_Mutineers._ “Why _additional_, Frankie?”

_Drake._ “Because Frankie doesn’t like True-egg!” And he added, “If

you want more _mutton_, just say so!”

(A very finished “cagger” is Frankie Drake.)

We had very variable weather during the last week or so of our voyage,

and I give herewith the record of the worst gale ever experienced by

any man on the _Terra Nova_. My journal suffered in consequence, but I

will copy my notes written just after the gale, _verbatim_. First of

all, here is a copy of the ship’s log for the worst days of the gale.

[Illustration:

A VERY “ORDINARY SEAMAN.”

(The writer.)

]

[Illustration:

PENNELL ON BRIDGE.

]

────────┬─────────┬──────┬───────┬────────┬────────────┬────┬──────┬─────

1912. │Distance.│ Max. │Course.│ Wind. │ Force. │Sea.│Barom.│Temp.

│ │speed.│ │ │ │ │ │

────────┼─────────┼──────┼───────┼────────┼────────────┼────┼──────┼─────

March 22│ │ │ │ │ │ │ │

a.m. │ 50 │5·9 at│ N. 30 │ S. │ 7 gale│ 7 │28·99 │30·8

│ │ │ W. │ │ │ │ │

p.m. │ 59·5 │7 a.m.│N. 7 W.│ „ │ 8 „ │ 8 │ — │ 37

────────┼─────────┼──────┼───────┼────────┼────────────┼────┼──────┼─────

March 23│ │ │ │ │ │ │ │

a.m. │ 37 │ 5·6 │ │ W.S.W. │ 8 gale│ 8 │28·78 │ 37

p.m. │ 48 │ noon │ │ „ │ 9 9 │ „ │ — │ —

────────┼─────────┼──────┼───────┼────────┼────────────┼────┼──────┼─────

March 24│ │ │ │ │ │ │ │

a.m. │ 52 │ 5 │ N. │ S.W. │ 8 gale│ 8 │28·73 │ 40

p.m. │ 57 │7 p.m.│N.N.W. │ „ │ 10 „ │ │ — │ —

────────┼─────────┼──────┼───────┼────────┼────────────┼────┼──────┼─────

March 25│ │ │ │ │ │ │ │

a.m. │ 49·5 │ 4·8 │ N. 22 │ S.S.W. │9 to 11 gale│ 9 │29·03 │ 37

p.m. │ 48·3 │ noon │ W. │ „ │ 8 „ │ 8 │ — │ 43

────────┼─────────┼──────┼───────┼────────┼────────────┼────┼──────┼─────

March 26│ │ │ │ │ │ │ │

a.m. │ 25·1 │ 3·4 │ N. 50 │S. by W.│ 7 │ 7 │29·66 │42·2

p.m. │Becalmed.│7 a.m.│ W. │ „ │ 2 │ 5 │ — │44·5

────────┴─────────┴──────┴───────┴────────┴────────────┴────┴──────┴─────

“_26th March._—It is now 12.40 p.m. We have had a satisfactory lunch

of roast mutton and treacle duff (_toujours mouton!_). It is nearly

calm, and we have all sail set, and are hurrooshing along at nearly

two miles an hour!

“I am five days behind in my diary. We have had a pretty sudden

gale—the worst ever felt by any one on board, I believe. It culminated

about midnight on the 24th or 25th. For several days it had been

blowing almost storm-force from the S.W., and so helped us along O.K.,

though rather too much westerly, and we could only drive along in

front of it. With three stormsails (main lower topsail, fore lower

topsail and inner jib) we went along for days at five miles an hour.

“On the evening of the 24th Day and I had First Watch. I was told off

to assist Pennell from 10 to 11 p.m. I put on my paraphernalia and

turned out on a wild stormy night, after prolonged bumping in my bunk

for three or four hours. It was awful on deck, the ship mostly with

her lee scuppers under water, and kept there at a constant heel, with

only three small stormsails. We were running before the gale (an

unusual experience nowadays, as Penelope cheerily pointed out!),

luckily just on our course. To windward (in south-west) the sky was

covered with gloomy clouds—several black bows, which always mean

squall-storms, being hideously apparent! White horses raced past the

bows, and were all one could see in the darkness. They looked just

like detached floes! The whole time we had to clutch the bridge rails

to prevent our rolling down to leeward.

“Then the sky got darker all over, the stars disappeared. A sudden

squall hit us, and then the shrouds started shrilling and booming. The

canvas screen on the bridge bulged in; your nose nearly blew off your

face if you looked over it, while the canvas made eddies which

deflected the wind into your face.

“The ship plunged forward into the black, sometimes partially

righting, but mostly lying over at 30°. Then the black squall passed

(in about ten minutes) and a patch of clear sky showed to windward.

Another squall-bow appeared, and we were battered and driven over

again. This lasted longer, about twenty minutes. Penelope asked me to

go to the standard compass (near the foremast) to check the steersman.

I got the electric torch and managed to crawl on to the ice-house

which supports the compass. Up a silly little ladder with no grip, and

in flapping oilskins to find Rennick there before me. Then I had to

crawl round and see that the helmsman was keeping his course. I

clutched at his screen-posts and wondered if they would blow overboard

next gust. (The screen went over next day!) About 10.40 a thick black

cloud enveloped the horizon to the west and gradually reached us. This

accompanied a squall where nature fairly burst her bounds! The sea was

blown flat, and the air filled with horizontal hurtling arrows of

sleet and water. I didn’t know that wind could show such malignancy!

Don’t know how the stormsails stood it, I suppose because the rigging

would do for a ship about twice this size! It was a snorter. Couldn’t

see more than a hundred feet, though there was no snow in the air.

Just solidified wind, I guess.

“If the sails had not held it would be called force 12—the maximum, as

it is they are content with force 11. Penelope said he enjoyed this

sort of thing, but I can’t say I was thrilled with enthusiasm, and I

preferred to be where the hurricane force was not quite so obtrusively

obvious! So at 11 p.m. I unselfishly called Bernard Day for his share

of the hell-broth, and went down below to try and forget it in sleep.”

It culminated at 3 a.m., when the starboard whaler was torn from one

davit. Just as they got a rope under the loose end the other broke

loose. So they cut it adrift after it had been bumping on the ship’s

side for some hours a few inches from Lieutenant Evans’ sickbed!

Bernard Day was nursing Evans, who was progressing satisfactorily,

though still very weak. However, by now he was nearly as cheerful as

usual, and his cabin was chiefly noticeable from the amount of

laughter emanating therefrom. He had onions, oranges, and beer in

excess of our ration, and got up for a few moments just before the

gale.

“Now that the engines are stopped (to save coal) we have to use the

hand-pumps continuously—about a quarter of an hour each four hours. In

the storm, owing to the rolling, it takes longer, for the well only

fills slowly through its small holes, and most of the bilge lies on

the lee side.

“The pump-handles (across the waist) are left on all the time now, and

with ‘life-lines’ they make something to grip as you sidle along the

deck. Ponting didn’t see the handle, and running to dodge a big wave

he was knocked silly by a blow on the brow. Result—two lovely black

eyes, and a thankful heart that his nose wasn’t broken!”

The same day a big sea pooped the ship and covered the steersman

(MacCarthy) in fifteen feet of water! It broke down the canvas screen

protecting him, but didn’t dismay MacCarthy. He had bad luck later,

also. For climbing the ratlines to free some tackle his helmet was

knocked off. It nearly came inboard on an incoming wave over the lee

bulwarks, but not quite. However, all that cheery MacCarthy said was,

“Maybe ’twill make the gale lessen a bit!”

There was naturally not much comfort anywhere on board, not even in

the cabins. I think the following extract speaks for itself—

“My bunk is just over the counter, where the waves bump every few

minutes, just over the screw; just under the chilled feet of the

steersman who dances on the deck, which is like a sounding board; and

just next the rudder, which has two dozen squeaks and groans of its

own. Add to this rolls varying from 30° to 50° each way.

“I have made a fine hanging candlestick from a chain of safety pins

and a bent wire, and this swings out and bangs my head. I stick in my

drawing-board at the side of the bunk, and so try to get some sleep in

the fearful rolling.

“There I lay, throughout the day,

Lying this and then that way,

Pain and cramp from toe to shoulder;

Up and down the tempest rolled her.

Pitch and toss, athwart across—

Never worse befell old Ross.

Waves belched round, above, right over

Poor old storm-tossed _Terra Nova_.”

On the 26th we had discussion of Amundsen’s chances, and I got Pennell

to draw a map of his winter quarters. This has some interest, as we

did not know anything of his movements for over a week yet.

[Illustration:

Chart of Bay of Whales, 78° S. + 164° W., after Amundsen.

]

“The _Discovery_ in 1902 found several deep bays in the edge of the

Ross Ice Barrier. Balloon Bight went in about ten miles. Shackleton in

1908 found that these had merged into one and he was stopped by

sea-ice at the head.

“Pennell in the _Terra Nova_ found Amundsen’s Hut (in February, 1911)

to be about two miles from the water on a ridge of old sea-ice about

thirty feet high, but hidden from the ship by another ridge of the

same nature.

“To the west was an indifferent lane half a mile wide which reached

_behind_ the hut. Here the sea-ice was only a few feet above the water

except where pressure occurred. The ice in the west of the lane was

breaking out. Behind this about four miles off was an eighty-foot

cliff of Ice Barrier with a path up in the south-east. I wouldn’t like

his winter, though if he lasted through the autumn he might be O.K.

afterwards. Anyhow, we’ll know in about a week now. We had a great cag

to-day. Some are still sure that Amundsen did nothing at the Pole. The

arguments are: (_a_) Amundsen never liked sledging; and (_b_) if he

meant to go up another glacier than the Beardmore, he’d have acquired

merit and said so!

“Contrariwise (_a_) if he found going easy he might have prospected up

an easy one, perhaps in 1911; and (_b_) if he’d gone astray, the Fram

would have come to us to investigate this year.”

“On the 27th we finished off the cable. It runs to 7,500 words, of

which the western party contributed 900. It is to be delivered to the

agent at Akaroa on Monday (first of April). A funny day to send off a

big cable, but it won’t be published till the 2nd in England, and ten

hours later in Australia. Meanwhile we loaf about till Wednesday

morning (minimum 36 hours), and then land at Lyttelton as soon as

possible.”

On the 30th the coal gang put in about six hours filling the bunkers,

so as to rest on Sunday. We shifted seven tons. The gale had rounded

the large lumps of coal, the impacts turning them into egg-shaped

boulders. The coal-dust was packed into a hard layer which we could

hardly break out with a pick! This is what clogged the pumps in 1910,

and in that gale Teddy Evans was head and shoulders under the bilge

water groping for the mud clogging the pump-roses.

During Sunday we slowly cruised towards Akaroa. After lunch we sighted

a school of eight sperm whales. We turned off and followed them.

Mostly one saw their broad rounded brown backs. Then one would raise

his head a little and blow off “steam,” not up straight but diagonally

forward. Sometimes their large triangular tail fins showed, and once

or twice the huge torpedo head appeared above water. Our harpoon gun

was out of order, but they were too shy to let us approach within

striking distance. Each of these whales was worth £300, so that there

was a small fortune in the whole school.

_Monday, April 1._—About 6 a.m. we approached Akaroa. It was a bright

morning as we entered the very fine harbour, the Heads reminding me of

those of Sydney. We could see the friendly light of the lighthouse

twinkling a greeting to us. Then we saw ragged clumps of the first

trees—two on the skyline resembling a pair of roosters fighting, and

sheep, like rabbits, browsing on the steep hillsides. We lay about a

mile off the little town, while Pennell and Drake went off in the

cutter and were met by a launch. All communication was forbidden with

the shore, but later two men in a small launch hovered around us. As

they pushed off they called out—

“Why didn’t you get back sooner? Amundsen got the Pole in a sardine

tin on the 14th December.”

“Pennell returned about 11 a.m. and confirmed it. Amundsen has done

wonderfully. His risky hut site was not so bad as we expected. In

place of howling blizzards four days in each week, he seems to have

had calm weather! But his bold dash up another glacier, his getting

five men there, and his nice behaviour after returning with regard to

Scott and his work have changed our opinion of him _in toto_.

“Scott will have reached the Pole about January 16. When he sees the

tent and flag there he will get a most unpleasant shock. Amundsen

started eleven days before Scott and was eighty miles nearer. He got

there only thirty days sooner, so that he didn’t march much quicker.

“In the west Gran and I agreed that he had a very good chance, and

Gran has written down in my sledge diary the day he (Amundsen) would

get there. I haven’t looked at it, but believe he was at the Pole at

the day Gran said!”

This prophecy has aroused some interest among psychologists at home!

So I will explain the circumstances. Gran woke up on December 20,

1911, when we were camped in the Punch Bowl and had been sledging over

a month. He declared that he knew that Amundsen was turning back. As

natural we pooh-poohed this. He said, “Well, I’ll write it down in

Grif’s book here.” He did so; but in my Browning and not in the diary

(as I say above).

[Illustration:

PONTING IS HERE ARRANGING THE CREW FOR A PHOTO OFF AKAROA. PROBABLY

HIS LAST EFFORT AT “PONTING” ANY OF US.

The dog Tsignan in the foreground.

]

This copy of Browning was left on Cape Roberts with all other

non-essentials on February 5. It remained there until picked up by

Priestley, six months after I had reached Australia. It was restored

to me in Priestley’s home at Tewkesbury in 1913, nearly two years

after Gran’s inscription. I looked through it and came on Gran’s note,

which I here reproduce. This is one of the most extraordinary

coincidences I know of, and owing to Gran’s isolation from all outside

information is perhaps unique.

I am personally of opinion that coincidence and not telepathy is

involved; though it is a fact that Gran never made any other attempt

to get an undoubted record of a dream, and he certainly believed this

to be something supernatural at the time!

During Monday we idled off Akaroa. Some fish were caught, Day hauling

in a huge barracouta and Evans a rock cod, which he caught as he was

sitting in a deck chair, and so celebrated his first day out of the

cabin. They tasted good at lunch! We trimmed eight tons of coal during

the day, so that only five were left! Then I had a huge bath, borrowed

a shirt, and got into clean clothes ready for civilization!

On Tuesday I packed all my gear, which was lucky, for I only had half

an hour to catch the Sydney boat finally. On Wednesday morning we

entered Lyttelton Harbour early in the morning. A tug came to meet us,

carrying Mrs. Wilson and Mrs. Evans. Pennell asked me to steer the

ship into harbour—why, I know not; unless he thought I looked too

respectable and might look more natural after a trick at the wheel.

However, one of the seamen did all the heavy brain work, and I merely

assisted at the tricky corners!

Simpson, Meares, and I hurried for the first train to Lyttelton.

Simpson was not specially noticeable except for his ski-boots, I had

on his shirt and Evans’ cap. Meares was clothed in a suit lent by Jim

Dennistoun, who said it was an old one of his father’s. I think

Meares’ departure was hastened by the advance of Mr. Dennistoun senior

to greet his son!

I spent only one day in Christchurch, for finding that a ship left for

Sydney that evening, I transhipped all my gear to the mailboat and was

back in Australia on the 7th April, 1912.

VIII

THE END OF THE EXPEDITION

THE END OF THE EXPEDITION

[Illustration:

Chart of parties, December 14, 1911 (Amundsen reaches the Pole).

]

I have brought the story of the Expedition up to April, 1912, so far

as my own part in it is concerned. But it will be of interest to give

a brief _résumé_ of the much more arduous journeys of the other

divisions of the Expedition.

Let us consider the distribution of the _personnel_ in the middle of

December. In the far north at Cape Adare, Campbell and his five mates

were awaiting the arrival of the _Terra Nova_ to take them to fresh

fields of work. The sea-ice had blown out early in spring, and they

had been cooped up on the rocky promontory unable to explore the

hinterland, just as had Borchgrevinck ten years earlier. The ship was

not due until early in January, but Levick’s penguin studies and

Priestley’s ice-notes testify to the industry of the scientific staff

during their imprisonment.

Further south my own party was preparing to climb the Mackay Glacier,

as recorded previously. We were to be taken north on the ship to Evans

Coves (to spend five weeks there during January and February) as soon

as the _Terra Nova_ could reach us.

At Headquarters Simpson was completing his meteorological

log—certainly the most valuable record of Antarctic weather which has

yet been obtained by any of the numerous expeditions to the southern

continent. Ponting was living at Cape Royds, and obtaining many of his

most successful studies of animal life.

To the south stretches the Great Ice Barrier, and somewhere off White

Island a party of two men are doggedly pursuing their homeward path.

They are dragging a queer contraption—a sledge burnt in half—and each

night have great difficulty in erecting their four-man tent. Neither

Day nor Hooper understands navigation, and their plight, if they miss

one of the old pony shelters, will be pitiable. They lie up during a

heavy blizzard, and then start off, desperate, through the drifting

snow. They arrive safely, and a few days later, returning on their

path, see their blindfold tracks passing along the narrow ridge

between two huge crevasses!

Another stage of some two hundred miles shows us, at the foot of the

Beardmore Glacier, a second supporting party, which has just bidden

farewell to Captain Scott. Meares, with Demetri and the dog teams, is

proceeding north again for his last journey on the Great Ice Barrier.

For three months he has been forwarding stores ahead of the pony

parties, and now the Pole party pushes on, unsupported by ponies or

dogs, on the two hardest stages to the Pole.

Scott has just finished the hardest day’s work he experienced on the

ascent of the Beardmore. “A most damnably dismal day,” he calls it.

Next day, the 14th—which is that on which all the positions in the

preceding figure have been charted—they begin to reach better

surfaces, and the three parties, under Evans, Bowers, and the leader,

swing along at an encouraging rate.

Far to the south—indeed, at the uttermost south—five Norwegians have

reached their goal: Amundsen, Bjaaland, Hanssen, Hassel, and Wisting.

After a few days’ rest they have verified their position, and made

sure of the Pole by a circular journey round the apparent site. And

now they are preparing to return to Framheim and the north.

Prestrud, Amundsen’s lieutenant, has just carried out his trip to King

Edward VII. Land. There, beyond the Barrier, he reached high land.

Rocky cliffs appeared in a few _nunatakker_ above the snow mantle. To

these they gave Scott’s name.

[Illustration:

Chart of parties, January 18, 1912 (Scott reaches the Pole).

]

The next chart shows the position of the parties on the 18th of

January, 1912. Cape Adare is now deserted. Campbell has been picked up

by the _Terra Nova_, and safely landed at Evans Coves for five weeks’

exploration between Mount Nansen and Mount Melbourne. Then the ship

sails south to pick up the western party at Granite Harbour, and to

communicate with Headquarters. The pack-ice is still solid in MacMurdo

Sound; the ship can do nothing till well into February. The western

party are waiting on Cape Roberts some twenty miles from the ship. As

narrated previously, they realize that there is no hope of relief in

that quarter, and later march overland to the hut.

Day and Meares have reached the hut, and Atkinson is now halfway home

across the Great Barrier. They have had an anxious rush to keep the

balance between food and time. Only one day—Christmas—has been

different from the many weary days of sledge-hauling. Among the

moraines near the “Cloud-maker,” Wright discovered a piece of marble

containing the first large Archæocyathine fossil from Antarctica.

Although vastly larger than Shackleton’s specimens, this is only a

centimetre long!

Lieutenant Evans has now also turned northward, and, with Lashley and

Crean, is nearing the foot of the Beardmore. For him worse troubles

are approaching. Worn out by constant sledging and unsuitable food, he

is attacked by scurvy, and only saved by the gallant devotion of his

naval mates.

Captain Scott has accomplished his task, and within the time he had

allotted to it. Realizing that if Amundsen came successfully through

the winter his methods must be speedier than those of the English

party, Scott proceeded steadily along the lines he had decided upon

when he left England. It was a bitter disappointment. Since Amundsen

had reached the Pole the year 1911 had passed away; and so the record

stands: “The South Pole: Amundsen 1911, Scott 1912.” How few will

realize that but a few weeks intervened between the two achievements!

[Illustration:

Chart of parties on March 21, 1911 (the last camp).

]

Meanwhile the Norwegian is speeding back to the _Fram_, and already

the hardest part of his journey is over. In mid-January the conditions

of the Barrier bear no remote resemblance to those in mid-March. No

one who has not experienced it can picture the enormous difference due

to the lapse of those two months.

The third chart shows the scene of the last tragedy. Far to the north

the ship is nearing civilization. Campbell’s party is isolated at

“Hell’s Gate,” their cheerless home at Evans Coves. Here in a hole in

the snow they wear out a weary existence for eight never-ending

months. No other Antarctic party has ever experienced such a test of

courage and endurance. Even Mawson’s three weeks alone gave less

opportunity for utter despair than the life of these six men from

March to October, 1912.

All communication is now cut off between Cape Evans and the Barrier.

At the 1910 Hut are Nelson, Debenham, Wright, and Gran with some of

the men, and fourteen miles south in the old _Discovery_ Hut are

Atkinson, Cherry-Garrard, Keohane, and Demetri. But two of these are

invalids—worn out by wild weather on the Barrier when they carried

further supplies to One Ton Depôt.

Eleven miles south of this depôt—and just beyond where Bowers and Gran

reached in the depôt trip of February, 1911—is the last camp of the

Pole party. All the world has been moved by Scott’s messages from this

formless yet historic site. It would be presumption in me to try and

describe it.