332 WITH SCOTT: THE SILVER LINING 



the latter was only opened once a week when the cooks 

 changed duty. 



A document which was consulted more frequently than any 

 other which we carried was Bowers' list of our stores. It 

 was headed, in a last flash of his humorous verbosity, " The 

 Western Physiphogeopetrovulcanological Party," and 

 gave me careful notes as to the stores at Butter Point, 

 and tips as to taking tin-openers, and bags for the cocoa 

 and pemmican tins we should find there. It got very frayed 

 with continual use, and this led to some anxiety later. All 

 the items were entered like this : — \ 



'* Biscuit for 20 weeks at 24/5 lbs. = 490 lbs." The 

 entry for tea 1 read as — 



"Tea for 20 weeks at 1*75 lbs.," but it was nearly 

 illegible, and later, after wondering why the tea was so 

 rapidly diminishing, I saw that his note really read i"] $ for 

 ten days (instead of " per week "). This was one of the 

 most welcome discoveries on our journey, for I thought I 

 had lost some bags of the precious beverage, and we soon 

 evened matters by greater economy. 



On the Sunday afternoon (5th November) Gran, Forde, 

 and I pulled the big sledge over the sea-ice to the west. We 

 had very heavy work dragging it over the snow near Cape 

 Evans, but owing to the track we had cut through the walls 

 at the great shear crack we crossed this quite easily. We 

 came on some mirror ice, where the runners positively flew 

 along, but a film of snowdrift about a quarter of an inch deep 

 made us nearly lie down in our traces. We took the sledge 

 about three miles out and then returned to the hut. En route 

 our collie bitch worried a seal almost to death, and though 

 Gran gave her a tremendous beating, I doubt if that even 

 made the dogs refrain from tormenting the helpless animals. 



Perhaps they felt that the seals were fair game, as they 

 were so much bigger than themselves ! 



On Monday a blizzard came up, in which superstitious 

 little Anton had a wild time reaching the hut. He had left 

 Ponting encamped at Little Razorback, and much preferred 

 to find his way back, rather than spend a night among the 

 howling demons of the Antarctic ! 



We had a council in the hut with Simpson and Nelson. 

 The latter very kindly volunteered to take Debenham's place 



