378 WITH SCOTT : THE SILVER LINING 



Iron to the snow plateau, and then a steep drop into the 

 " Devil's Punchbowl." The latter was a fascinating spot, 

 and on the 20th we shifted camp so as to examine it more 

 closely. 



We were encamped on a small beach beneath the rocky- 

 wall of the new glacier, which we called the " Devil's Ridge." 

 Probably the state of my finger accounted for His Satanic 

 Majesty's frequent presence on the map hereabouts. The 

 Punch Bowl was an empty cwm or bowl-valley, which had 

 been eaten into the steep southern edge of the Flat Iron. Its 

 floor was below sea-level, and it would thus appear to indicate 

 subsidence, for we have no idea how the accepted methods of 

 eroding cwms (by " thaw and freeze " chiefly) could act under 

 water. The New Glacier had very lately ceased to fall over 

 the Devil's Ridge into the cwm. It is only six feet below the 

 ridge, and there is a drop of five hundred feet to the floor 

 of the latter. In fact, thaw waters still cross the ridge and 

 flow through the debris and down into the cwm. It is 

 perfectly obvious that very little power is exercised by the 

 " New Glacier," or it would have swept the Punch Bowl out 

 of existence. 



There was a little tarn held back by a large bank of snow 

 near the top of the ridge, and here Gran celebrated midsummer 

 by a bathe ! I envied him, but could not follow suit owing 

 to my disabled hand. 



Across the bowl a small hanging glacier entered the cwm 

 but did not reach the sea ice below. We called this the 

 Dewdrop Glacier. It terminated in a rhomb-shaped face 

 which was three hundred feet above the bay. In the bay 

 itself was a great thickness of ice, and Debenham and myself 

 had many arguments as to its origin. He believed it was 

 an ancient relic of the Dewdrop Glacier ; but I inclined to 

 the belief that it represented old floe ice jammed up the 

 narrow bowl by sea ice from without. Gran and I ran a 

 line of levels across it with the theodolite, which showed that 

 it was still afloat although in places it rose many feet above 

 the bay level. 



We were running short of stores, so Gran and I marched 

 back to our headquarters. While I collected the stores he 

 looked around for skua eggs and soon found eight. The 

 sea kale did not show that verdant growth which Gran had 



