﻿XI. 



Mawson required a good all-round collector for his Antarctic 

 expedition, the set vices of Mr. Harrisson A\'ere recommended, 

 and he was enrolled. 



The position of Naturalist to the Western Party, under 

 Mr. F. Wild, was allotted to him. Opportunities for 

 zoological collecting Avere scarce, but what could be done was 

 done. Ever cheerful, ever helpfiil, he was a comrade whose 

 energy and good temper were proof against starvation and 

 such miseries as Antarctic explorers endure. In the " Home 

 of the Blizzard," Wild AATites, '' many of the gusts must have 

 exceeded one hundred miles per hour, since one of them 

 lifted Harrisson, who was standing beside me, clean over my 

 head and threw him nearly twenty feet." A number of 

 Harrisson's coloured drawings of Antarctic scenery embellish 

 Mawson's book. 



A shipmate on the " Aurora " (Mr. J. H. Collinson Close) 

 has supplied the following information : — " Mr. C. T. Har- 

 risson was deeply respected and liked by us all. He impressed 

 one, on my first acquaintance, as being one whom the Ex- ■ 

 pedition Leader and we, his comrades, would ill have afforded 

 to dispense with. Usually preoccupied in thought, and of 

 earnest, serious manner, his slow, deliberate conversation was 

 listened to attentively by the most thoughtful among us. 

 Whether it was heaving on the ' Noah's Ark ' windlass to 

 weigh anchor, turning out in the 'wee sma' hours of a dirty 

 morning to haul — in bitter icy gale — on frozen topsail- 

 halliards and A\-eather braces, or taking a trick at the wheel, 

 manning a boat in a 'jobbly' sea or shovelling coal in the 

 stoke-hole, Harrisson was ever to the fore. Harrisson's 

 sledging exploits around the ' Second Base ' of the Expedition 

 need no comment here, beyond remarking that he did as 

 much — if not more — sledging than anybody else in the party, 

 or indeed in the Expedition, with the exception of our 

 courageous leader. Sir D. Mawson, and his own Base-leader, 

 Mr. Frank Wild. 



' ' His artistic work Avith brush, crayon and pastel excited 

 universal admiration. The first icebergs we encountered, 

 steaming south, he transferred to canvas, sketching with 

 remarkable fidelity and rapidity the various shaded azure 

 tints of the crevassed ice, and snow mantles of virgin white 

 enshrouding the bergs. Harrisson was ah\"ays ready to 

 impart useful information from knowledge born of his years 

 of practical training and experience, to any caring to avail 

 themselves of the opportunity. In view of his many admir- 

 able talents, and the circumstances that he Avas, in all things, 

 a shining example to younger men, his presence on such an 



