FIRST CROSSING OF ANTARCTICA— ELLSWORTH 317 



on my nerves, so that I was glad to get back into the four walls of the 

 tent. There are 24 hours of daylight in this region at this time of 

 year, and that, too, wears on the nerves. The temperature was 

 15° below freezing. During our 19 hours here we strung up the 

 antenna wires on the bamboo sledge poles, worked the sledging-set 

 transmitter by hand, and kept on sending calls, both general and to 

 the Wyatt Earp, but we got only one response during the 22 days of 

 our journey across Antarctica, and that was: "We can't hear you." 

 The dead reckoning position of the camp was latitude 80°28' S., 

 longitude 141°02', but our ground speed had been much overestimated, 

 for the position as determined by our observations was 80°20' S., 

 104° W. And we had not then overcome the trouble with the sextant. 

 When its index error was eventually discovered and the sights recom- 

 puted, it proved to be 79°15' S., 102°35' W. The snow on the high 

 plateau was granular and packed so hard that the skis of the plane 

 made little impression. The surface elevation was 6,400 feet, and the 

 plateau extended with sHght undulations in all directions. 



The Pole lay 750 miles south, Dundee Island 1,550 miles behind us, 

 the coast line of the continent several hundred miles to the north, 

 and the Bay of Wliales 750 miles ahead. It was here that I raised 

 the American flag, and so far as that act would allow, claimed the 

 sector between longitudes 80° to 120° W. for the United States, having 

 aheady in my mmd named it James W. Ellsworth Land after my 

 father. That part of the plateau above 6,000 feet I called Hollick- 

 Kenyon Plateau. We set up our balloon-silk tent and took repeated 

 altitudes of the sun with the sextant. 



After 19 hours at Camp I, we again took to the air at 17.00 on 

 November 24 in calm weather, but looking thick ahead. We felt we 

 must push on, for our chances of a successful crossing were decreased 

 in proportion to the time we lost at any one place. We soon experi- 

 enced low visibility, and at the end of a short half hour we were finally 

 forced to land again, with a ground elevation of 6,000 feet. We were 

 surprised at the ease with which we could land or take off on a hard 

 surface. It required no more than 50 yards to rise from the snow 

 when we left the first camp on November 24. This is all the more 

 remarkable since we had no assisting wind, and since we were at an 

 elevation of 6,400 feet above sea level. 



At Camp II, we waited 3 days for good weather, trying strenuously 

 and continually, but fortunately unsuccessfully, to fix our position. 

 I say fortunately because the number of observations we made here 

 were useful later in tracing the error of our sextant. After getting 

 only a very rough approximation to our position, we took off in great 

 uncertainty about the precise direction of Little America. 



This was on November 27. After 90 miles, we landed in a fog, and 

 at 02.30 a blizzard was upon us. On November 28, 29, and 30 we 



