60 THE VOYAGE OF THE 'DISCOVERY' [Dec. 



left a broad gap between, but low in this gap hung the tanta- 

 lising bank of fog, screening all that lay beyond. By turning 

 towards the strait we had partly obscured our clear view of 

 Mount Longstaff and quite cut off the miraged images of the 

 more distant land, but we had approached the high cliffs 

 which formed the southern limit of the strait, and in the 

 morning sun could clearly see the irregular distribution of red 

 and black rock in the steep cliff faces. 



'In hope that the fog-bank to the west would clear, we 

 proceeded with our packing in a leisurely manner, and when 

 all was ready, turned our faces homewards. It was significant 

 of the terrible condition of our team that the turn produced no 

 excitement. It appears to make no difference to them now in 

 which direction they bend their weary footsteps; it almost 

 seems that most of them guess how poor a chance they have 

 of ever seeing the ship again. And so we started our home- 

 ward march, slowly at first, and then more briskly as we realised 

 that all chance of a clearance over the strait was gone. 



' In the flood of sunlight which now illumined the snow 

 about us, we were able to see something of the vast ice 

 upheavals caused by the outflow of ice from the strait ; 

 pushing around the cape, it is raised in undulations which 

 seem to run parallel to the land. We directed our course 

 towards the cape with the hopes of getting to the land, but 

 were obliged to keep outwards to avoid the worst disturbances ; 

 this brought us obliquely across the undulation, and as we 

 travelled onward they rose in height and became ridged and 

 broken on the summit. Now, too, we came upon numerous 

 crevasses which appeared to extend radially from the cape, 

 and these, with the cracks and ridges, formed a network of 

 obstruction across our path through which we were forced to 

 take a very winding course. 



'We extended our march until we had passed the worst 

 of this disturbance, and by that time we were well to the north 

 of the cape and abreast of one of the curious rocky groins that 

 occur at intervals along the coast. This showed samples of 

 both the red and the black rock, which seem to constitute the 



