i9l A TIRING START 107 



of difference, as he handles the stove with more economy than 

 any other of us. 



October i. We turned out at 5.30 A.M. The morning was 

 still and overcast, but with the sun trying to break through. We 

 got away by 7, but made slow progress, finding the drifts very 

 heavy. My unit consisted of Priestley, Dickason, and myself, 

 with the 1 2-ft. sledge, and as Levick had the iron runner sledge 

 we had the heavier load. We had to relay most of the day, as 

 Dickason could pull very little and Browning not at all. In fact 

 the latter had to rest constantly, so our progress was slow, and 

 by lunch time we had only made 2^ miles. Our supply of oil 

 would not run to hot lunch, so we had a cold lunch sitting 

 under the lee of the sledge. Before leaving the igloo we had 

 cooked some seal steaks over the blubber fire, but when ex- 

 amined in the light of day these looked so filthy and distasteful, 

 that we discarded them in favour of shreds of raw penguin and 

 seal. 



The walking had made both Dickason and Browning much 

 worse, so I had to camp at 6.30 P.M., having only done 5 miles. 

 We are all very tired, but in good spirits at leaving the dirt and 

 squalor of the hut behind. A lovely evening and every appear- 

 ance of a fine day .to-morrow. 



October 2. A fine morning when we turned out at 5.30. 

 The surface was rather better and we did not have to relay, but 

 it was all we could do to move the sledges. About 1 1 o'clock 

 we got on to a blue ice surface and worked our way through a 

 loose moraine. A bitter wind from the plateau got up about 

 noon, bringing drift that in the squalls was so thick one could 

 not see more than a few yards. The wind was fair, however, and 

 we raced along over the blue ice until we suddenly came to a 

 huge crevasse barring our passage. We proceeded cautiously 

 along its edge to the eastward until we found a place where it 

 was snow bridged, and then leaving the sledges with Levick and 

 Browning, the rest of us roped up and went across, testing it 

 with our ice-axes as we advanced. 



The snow bridge was 175 paces across, and except for one 

 place on the weather side it seemed perfectly safe. I should 

 like to have stayed and examined it, as from its width it had 

 more the appearance of an inlet of the sea ending in a wide 

 crevasse, but the gale was rising and the drifting snow so thick 



