444 



WITH SCOTT : THE SILVER LINING 



animate and inanimate nature. Each night was longer, each 

 march a harder fight against the blizzard drift. 



I used to wonder how Shackleton managed his wonderful 

 feat with an unsupported party. He told me that he would 

 never have got through if it had been calm, nor if the wind 

 had been but a trifle different. For days, on their return 

 Barrier journey, they were marching through drift which did 

 not rise to their eyes and so block their view ; but was due to 

 a southern blizzard wind just strong enough to fill their sail 

 and push them to the north. Captain Scott met with no such 

 fortune. He was a month later than Shackleton, and when 

 Oates fell sick their chance had gone. 



I do not believe that unaided the three men would have 

 survived even if they had reached One Ton Depot. There 

 was no chance of thorough rest there, and nothing else could 

 have saved them. At their slow rate of marching they were 

 still ten days from Discovery Hut, and such a period of 

 exposure would have been too much for them. 

 Their journey was a supreme struggle against 

 all the powers of Nature, and when all human 

 effort had been expended they succumbed, win- 

 ning a deathless renown which has aroused the 

 envy of all brave men and the admiration of the 

 world. 



On their last few marches, when everything 

 was fighting against them, they kept the speci- 

 mens gathered by Wilson at the head of the 

 Beardmore Glacier. Scott writes, " The geo- 

 logical specimens carried at Wilson's request 

 will be found with us or on our sledge." It 

 is pleasant to think that these specimens, which 

 must have a greater sentimental value than any 

 others of their kind, have also a greater scientific 

 value than any hitherto obtained in the Antarctic. 

 Glossopteris, At the Australian meetings of the British Asso- 

 a ermo-Car- c \^[ on Professor Seward gave two lectures deal- 



bonuerous fern . . , , r ., . & , . , , , 



ing with the fossil leaves which they contained. 

 Perfect examples of the fern-like plant Glossopteris 

 were preserved — closely related to those occurring 

 in India, Australia, South Africa, and South 

 In fact, this plant is the emblem of the ancient 



from the Upper 

 Beardmore 

 Glacier. 



America. 



