i9l MARCHING AGAIN 191 



see them just below us. The surface was not very good, usually 

 two inches deep in snow and occasionally a foot deep. This 

 did not promise easy sledging; but the snow was dry now, and 

 I was going to cut down the weights to a minimum. 



We could see open water about twenty miles off, but a huge 

 mass of ice pack was apparent as far north as we could see. 

 There seemed to be a broad belt of pack, at least sixty miles 

 long, which was quite absent in January 1902. 



Obviously our exploration of Terra Nova Bay was impos- 

 sible now, and it looked as if the ship would never reach us at 

 Cape Roberts. With good luck we might cross the piedmont 

 glacier to Cape Bernacchi in a few days, and Pennell might find 

 it easier to reach us there, while we should at any rate be nearer 

 to headquarters. There was also a week's food there, and we 

 had now only a fortnight's sledging stores left. 



On February 4, Gran and I explored tfte v sea ice below the 

 piedmont for about four miles to the southward. We passed 

 through the fifteen bergs in the little bay, and then got among 

 the screw pack. This was covered with snow and afforded us 

 extremely heavy going, as may be imagined. Near the shore 

 was a perfect network of new cracks with the ice ' working ' all 

 the time. Below the glacier wall was a deep tide crack four feet 

 wide, but where some ice blocks had fallen in we managed to get 

 across to fixed ice. As a result of this journey I decided to 

 march first along the sea ice, and then climb up the piedmont at 

 this point. 



Next morning I wrote a long letter to Pennell which we all 

 signed. We made a depot on the highest point of the cape, and 

 fixed a flag alongside with the letter in a little tin match-box. The 

 journal for Captain Scott I left in the food cairn in my ditty-bag. 

 I remorselessly weeded out every one's gear. We took nothing 

 but what we stood up in, and our notes and the instruments. 

 Luckily most of Debenham's and all Gran's negatives were films, 

 but I had to leave nearly all my plates and my cherished Brown- 

 ing. I knew we had some bad crevassed country to traverse 

 thirty miles of this and then I expected thirty miles of coast 

 work, largely over moraine and rock, where we should have 

 to portage the sledge and all our gear on our backs. This would 

 bring us to Butter Point, whence our route was the same as in the 

 previous summer. With a light sledge it was just possible we 



