THE FIRST ICEBERGS 285 



The weather in the " Foggy Fifties " varied between 

 gales, calms, fogs, snowstorms, and other delights. As 

 a rule, the engine was now kept constantly ready, in 

 case of our being so unlucky as to come too near an 

 iceberg. Fortunately, however, we did not meet any 

 of these until early on the morning of January 1, 1911, 

 when we saw some typical Antarctic bergs; that is to 

 say, entirely tabular. Our latitude was then a little 

 over 60° S., and we were not far off the pack. On the 

 1st and 2nd we sailed southward without seeing any- 

 thing but scattered bergs and a constantly increasing 

 number of lumps of ice, which showed us we were get- 

 ting near. By 10 p.m. on the 2nd we came into slack 

 drift-ice; the weather was foggy, and we therefore kept 

 going as near as might be on the course to the Bay of 

 Whales, which was destined to be our base. 



A good many seals were lying on the ice-floes, and as 

 we went forward we shot some. As soon as the first 

 seal was brought on board, all our dogs had their first 

 meat meal since Madeira ; they were given as much as 

 they wanted, and ate as much as they could. We, too, 

 had our share of the seal, and from this time forward we 

 had fresh seal-steak for breakfast at least every day; it 

 tasted excellent to us, who for nearly half a year had 

 been living on nothing but tinned meat. With the 

 steak whortleberries were always served, which of 

 course helped to make it appreciated. The biggest 

 seal we got in the pack-ice was about 12 feet long, and 



