86 SCOTT'S LAST EXPEDITION [FEBRUARY 
February 17.—Still blowing hard, with drift, but clear over- 
head. In the afternoon we packed up, and pulled over to the 
main depot, as the ship was due the following day. We camped 
late in the evening in our old place under the moraine. Blow- 
ing a heavy gale all night. 
February 18 to 29.—Most of this time while we were wait- 
ing for the Terra Nova the wind blew with uninterrupted violence 
and the tents suffered considerably. Our own tent split near the 
cap, but after several failures we managed to tie a lashing 
round the top and so saved the split from spreading to the body 
of the canvas. 
Levick’s tent also split near the opening, and Abbott was 
obliged to sew the rent up in spite of the coldness of the blizzard. 
On February 24 the blizzard lulled for a short time and 
we were enabled to get a little exercise, but the whole of this 
time was occupied with a not too cheerful discussion about food. 
Our sledging provisions were due to give out on the 27th 
and it was necessary to reserve at least half of the depot food 
for the sledge journey down the coast in the spring which would 
become inevitable should the ship not relieve us. It was there- 
fore necessary to reduce the ration at once, and I asked Priestley 
to take charge of all food from now on till the time we were 
relieved or relieved ourselves. 
We decided to reduce the biscuit to half ration and cut out 
everything else for the time being except seal meat and a small 
portion of pemmican for flavouring. This same day we were 
fortunate enough to kill a small crab-eater seal. I tasted a small 
piece of raw blubber and rather liked it, while Abbott and 
Browning declared that it had a very strong flavour of melon. 
It was some time, however, before the blubber was added 
to our diet as a regular ration. During this short period of 
calm several times one or other of the party thought they saw 
smoke off the end of the Drygalski, but there seems no doubt 
that what they saw was only what is known as frost smoke, 
the vapour from the leads of open water on pack ice, though 
the ship certainly was at one time within 25 miles of us. 
On the 27th further discomfort was added to our condition 
as the gale was accompanied by blinding drift, so that we had 
all the unpleasantness of a barrier blizzard with no adequate 
shelter; for the tents were threadbare and torn in several 
