426 WITH SCOTT: THE SILVER LINING 



Priestley's log for the Northern Party showed that we at 

 Cape Evans had been having calms while they, at Cape Adare, 

 had experienced a twelve-days' hurricane ! 



One morning I visited the scene of the pump's disaster of 

 December, 1910. There is a wooden shaft enclosing the two 

 pump tubes and just large enough to enable a man to climb 

 down a ladder at one side. It reached the bilge, and here 

 the pump tubes dipped into the latter. Before the gale it 

 was only possible to get into the shaft by the main hatchway. 

 We inspected it by a lighted matchbox, for the electric lamp 

 was out of order. Under the main deck and at the side of 

 the engine-room was the hole * cut through the iron bulk- 

 head during the great gale February 12, 19 10, and then the 

 pump shaft was entered by tearing off the side boards at Y. 

 For it was impossible to raise the hatches and enter in the 

 ordinary way. Now the nozzles were made removable, and 

 the entry from the engine-room was kept clear, so that the 

 same danger could not recur. The sounding rod was let 

 down a tube in one corner of this well also. 



On the 7th the temperature had been + 7 , and now five 

 days later we reached freezing-point (32 ). Thus the weather 

 was about 5 warmer for each day's run north. 



" 1 2th March. — I had a queer dream about the School of 

 Geology at Sydney, which was quite consistent, and ended 

 with some one going out and banging the door violently. . . . 

 So violently that I awoke — to find the rudder nearly banging 

 itself off with the heavy swell. It is funny how the sleeping 

 mind adapts itself to real sounds ! 



" There was no wind, but we had most awful rolling, 41 

 from the vertical, so that the swinging lamp in my cabin is 

 nearly lying on its side. My books sling off the shelves, my 

 boxes come adrift, I was tossed across the cabin, and all the 

 plates, etc., on the tables jump right over the fiddles ! When 

 we turned in I couldn't keep still, though jammed by my 

 knees, toes, back, and head. I stuck in a drawing-board to 

 prevent my being flung out, and got no sleep, but a stiff neck 

 through using it as a strut." 



Simpson amused us with some early recollections of 

 Sunday schools. " How did Absalom die ? " Loud chorus 

 from the afterguard, " Caught by his hair and hanged." 



* See sketch, p. 42. 



