APPENDIX 427 



It is a great wonder the whole sledge did not drop through: the inside 

 was like the cliff of Dover. 



Note 14, p. 136. — February 28. Meares and I led off with a dog 

 team each, and leaving the Barrier we managed to negotiate the first 

 long pressure ridge of the sea ice where the seals all lie, without much 

 trouble — the dogs were running well and fast and we kept on the old 

 tracks, still visible, bj' which we had come out in January, heading a 

 long way out to make a wide detour round the open water off Cape 

 Armitage, from which a very v/ide extent of thick black fog, ' frost 

 smoke ' as we call it, was rising on our right. This completely obscured 

 our view of the open water, and the only suggestion it gave me was 

 that the thaw pool off the Cape was much bigger than when we passed 

 it in January and that we should probably have to make a detour 

 of three or four miles round it to reach Hut Point instead of one or two. 

 I still thought it was not impossible to reach Hut Point this way, so 

 we went on, but before we had run two miles on the sea ice we noticed 

 that we were coming on to an area broken up by fine thread-like cracks 

 evidently quite fresh, and as I ran along by the sledge I paced them and 

 found they curved regularly at every 30 paces, which could only mean 

 that they were caused by a swell. This suggested to me that the thaw 

 pool off Cape Armitage was even bigger than I thought and that we were 

 getting on to ice which was breaking up, to flow .north into it. 

 We stopped to consider, and found that the cracks in the ice w^e were on 

 were the rise and fall of a swell. Knowing that the ice might remain 

 like this with each piece tight against the next only until the tide turned, 

 I knew that we must get off it at once in case the tide did turn in the 

 next half-hour, when each crack would open up into a wide lead of open 

 water and we should find ourselves on an isolated floe. So we at once 

 turned and went back as fast as possible to the unbroken sea ice. Obviously 

 it was now unsafe to go round to Hut Point by Cape Armitage and we 

 therefore made for the Gap. It was between eight and nine in the 

 evening when we turned, and we soon came in sight of the pony party, 

 led as we thought by Captain Scott. We were within Y2 a mile of them 

 when we hurried right across their bows and headed straight for the Gap, 

 making a course more than a right angle off the course we had been on. 

 There was the seals' pressure ridge of sea ice between us and them, but 

 as I could see them quite distinctly I had no doubt they could see us, 

 and we were occupied more than once just then in beating the teams off 

 stray seals, so that we didn't go by either very quickly or very silently. 

 From here we ran into the Gap, where there was some nasty pressed-up ice 

 to cross and large gaps and cracks by the ice foot ; but with the Alpine rope 

 and a rush we got first one team over and then the other without mishap 

 on to the land ice, and were then practically at Hut Point. However, ex- 

 pecting that the pony party was following us, we ran our teams up on to 

 level ice, picketed them, and pitched our tent, to remain there for the night, 

 as we had a half-mile of rock to cross to reach the hut and the sledges would 

 have to be carried over this and the dogs led by hand in couples — a very 

 long job. Having done this we returned to the ice foot with a pick and a 



