THE GRANITE HARBOUR EXPEDITION 



347 



surface. We camped about half a mile from the huge Pied- 

 mont, and set out next day for a remarkable line of icebergs. 

 On our left was the great glacier, the cliff edge dropping to 

 sea-level at a brownish boss which 1 thought might show some 

 rock. But it was merely stained ice badly crevassed and 

 stepped like a land-slip. I expected to reach this the same 

 night, but luckily our sledge-meter is a better guide as to 

 when we've done enough. Four and a half miles, if we have 

 been relaying, takes eleven hours hard work (less lunch time). 

 Anyhow, the brown boss was still three miles beyond our 

 camp, as we found later. (I expect that the pseudo-island was 

 derived from this breaking ice-cape, for there was a huge group 

 of bergs just ahead of us.) 



" I don't take very full geological notes for obvious 

 reasons. We see a piece of rock about every three days ! " 



There was in fact no leisure for any scientific work. We 

 were too dog-tired to stir far from the tent. Even the ice 

 was unusually uninteresting from a scientific point of view. 

 We watched it with very particular care nevertheless. Here- 

 abouts a rather low screw-pack had been covered by recent 

 snows, and the alternation of hard blocks and trenches filled 

 with snow made a surface calculated to keep us all on the 

 qui vive. I took Gran abreast of me in the harness, and 

 so we explored most of the pitfalls, thereby saving Deben- 

 ham's lame leg from the worst surfaces. 



We did some wonderful wriggles, and if the ice ridges 

 were fairly frequent — say every five feet — the sledges revelled 

 in the track. For the runners only touched at these points, 

 and the weight was supported above the soft fields of snow. 



It was a wonderful field of bergs among which we now 

 encamped. There were fifteen in all shapes and sizes. 

 Several were low and tabular, while two were higher and 

 cubic in shape. One was a dirty brown, and was possibly a 

 brother of the pseudo-island. Two others were shaped 

 like newts, with a sharp jagged crest. They were, I suppose, 

 overturned bergs. 



At 9.30 on the evening of the 26th we left our camp 

 among the bergs, and dodged in and out among them towards 

 the low rocky cape just to the north of us. Huge granite 

 tors crowned it, and great blocks of ice six feet across had 

 been hurled many feet on to the cape by the gales of the 



