FIRST WESTERN EXPEDITION 153 



northward, so that seven miles of it had broken away since the 

 ship landed us. It is quite impossible to tell whether sea-ice 

 is solid or not, for the first cracks are so small and the eleva- 

 tion of the eye so little that the only safe way to traverse 

 sea-ice in late summer is to keep off it ! 



We expected to find the Butter Point piedmont an easy 

 level surface, but of its kind it was the worst I met with 

 down south. All the afternoon we were plugging up an 

 interminable snow slope. Just as one got one's foot braced 

 to draw the sledges through the clinging snow, it would break 

 through a crust and sink nearly to the knee. Then we would 

 meet a few yards of firmer surface and bet whether we could 

 make a dozen steps before the soft " mullock " started again. 

 Even worse was the jar when you expected deep snow and 

 found a firm crust one inch below the surface. I carried a 

 pedometer, and when we had done 27,500 of these paces I 

 felt we had earned our supper. 



Blue Glacier now confronted us. P.O. Evans and I pros- 

 pected across the snout, and were glad to find that though it 

 showed crevasses in places, yet it was so free from snow that 

 we should have no great difficulty in crossing them. They 

 curved round parallel to the coast, and, of course, lay along 

 the line of our march, so that we came on to them end-on 

 and fell in several times. But by the evening of the 15th we 

 were safely camped in the rugged ice south of the crevassed 

 portion. Evans as usual enlivened us with navy yarns. He 

 illustrated the kindness of the sailorman by a story of a mate 

 of his who started a poultry-farm. To Jack's disgust the 

 ducks in his yard had no belief in altruism and with their 

 broad bills gave the hens no chance. " So," said TafF Evans, 

 " evenchooly he gets a file and trims their bills like the hens, 

 and then everything went all sprowsy ! " 



If any one had asked us what we should like sent post 

 haste from civilization, there would have been a unanimous 

 yell of " Boots ! " The rough scrambling over the rocks and 

 jagged ice of the past fortnight, and the alternate soaking and 

 freezing they had experienced, had ruined mine completely. 

 Deep constrictions formed in the leather across the toe and 

 behind the ankle and raised great blisters, and even boils 

 in Debenham's case. I had no sole on the right foot, but 

 within the next day or so the temperature fell considerably 



