i9] SMOOTHER SURFACE 45 



Erebus and Terror, some very unusually delicate spider-web-like 

 cirrus cloudlets, coloured dark reddish, and looking like tangled 

 thread or like unravelled silk they were slight and thin, but 

 very well defined, and they changed very slowly. 



Monday, July 31, 1911. We turned out soon after 5 A.M. 

 and had calm clear weather again ahead of us, though Terror 

 was apparently again in trouble, for it was covered in a cap cloud. 



We had good going and had covered 5^2 miles in 5^ hours 

 by the time we reached the edge of the Barrier about 1 1 / 2 miles 

 off the Pram Point ridges. 



The surface of the Barrier during this march had to-day be- 

 come very much harder and more windswept. It was not cut 

 into sastrugi, but polished into low, flatly rounded areas, with 

 only occasional drifts of sandy snow, which dragged heavily and 

 allowed the feet to sink in through a thin crust. The difference 

 this walking on a hard surface made to the warmth of our feet 

 was very noticeable, notwithstanding that the temperature was 

 still -57. 



At the Barrier edge we simply ran down a drift slope on to 

 the sea ice, which had only a few inches of snow covering, six 

 inches at the most as noted by Bowers, and hard and windswept. 

 Here again we felt the flow of cold air pouring from the Barrier 

 on to the sea ice, so we camped about 100 yards away to be out 

 of it and had lunch. The temp, here was 43. The sledge- 

 meter now showed 38 miles from our camp in the Knoll gap at 

 Cape Crozier. From this point to Hut Point was 3 miles, and 

 it was again an excellent hardened smooth snow surface all the 

 way to Cape Armitage, and rather the same rough, crunchy 

 sea ice, with very few snow-covered patches, from Cape Armi- 

 tage to Hut Point. 



By the time we reached the hut the sky had become com- 

 pletely overcast and the temp, had gone up to 27. It was 

 still quite calm, and the sky cleared again during the night. We 

 camped at the hut. [The last day we had been using our oil to 

 warm ourselves, since we had a half tin left, having used the first 

 half very sparingly. Birdie made a bottom for the cooker out 

 of an empty biscuit tin, which was most successful. We cooked 

 on Bill's bag in the middle, generally one of us steadying the 

 cooker with his hands. 



It used to be quite a common experience to spill some water 



