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 2yth 

 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 



