CHAPTER XVII 

 ON THE BEARDMORE GLACIER 



Sunday, December lo. — Camp 32.* I was very anxious 

 about getting our loads forward over such an appalling surface, 

 and that we have done so is mainly due to the ski. I roused 

 everyone at 8, but it was noon before all the readjustments of 

 load had been made and we were ready to start. The dogs car- 

 ried 600 lbs. of our weight besides the depot (200 lbs.). It 

 was greatly to my surprise when we — my own party — with a 

 ' one, two, three together ' started our sledge, and we found 

 it running fairly easily behind us. We did the first mile at a 

 rate of about 2 miles an hour, having previously very care- 

 fully scraped and dried our runners. The day was gloriously 

 fine and we were soon perspiring. After the first mile we began 

 to rise, and for some way on a steep slope we held to our ski 

 and kept going. Then the slope got steeper and the surface 

 much worse, and we had to take off our ski. The pulling after 

 this was extraordinarily fatiguing. We sank above our finnesko 

 everywhere, and in places nearly to our knees. The runners of 

 the sledges got coated with a thin film of ice from which we 

 could not free them, and the sledges themselves sank to the 



* While Day and Hooper, of the ex-motor party, had turned back on November 24, 

 and Mcares and Demetri with the dogs ascended above the Lower Glacier Depot before 

 returning on December ii, the Southern Party and its supports were organised succes- 

 sively as follows: 



December 10, leaving Shambles Camp — 



Sledge I. Scott, Wilson, Oatcs and P.O. Evans. 

 Sledge 2. E. Evans, Atkinson, Wrigiit, Lashly. 

 Sledge 3. Bowers, Cherry-Garrard, Crean, Keohane. 

 December 21 at Upper Glacier Depot — 

 Sledge I. Scott, Wilson, Gates, P.O. Evans. 



Sledge 2. E. Evans, Bowers, Crean, Lashly, while Atkinson, Wright, Cherry- 

 Garrard and Keohane returned. 

 January 4, 150 miles from the Pole — 



Sledge I. Scott, Wilson, Oates, Bowers, P.O. Evans; while E. Evans, Crean, and 

 Lashly returned. 



