338 WORST JOURNEY IN THE WORLD 



is hard to recall in the enjoyment of the present how 

 irritable and weary you felt only twenty hours ago. The 

 whisper of the sledge, the hiss of the primus, the smell of 

 the hoosh and the soft folds of your sleeping-bag: how 

 jolly they can all be, and generally were. 



I would that I could once again 



Around the cooker sit 

 And hearken to its soft refrain 



And feel so jolly fit. 



Instead of home-life's silken chains, 



The uneventful round, 

 I long to be mid snow-swept plains, 



In harness, outward bound. 



With the pad, pad, pad, of fin'skoed feet, 

 With two hundred pounds per man, 



Not enough hoosh or biscuit to eat, 

 Well done, lads ! Up tent! Outspan. 



(Nelson in The South Polar Times.) 



Certainlyas we skirted these mountains, range upon range, 

 during the next two marches (November 30 and December 

 1), we felt we could have little cause for complaint. They 

 brought us to lat. 8 2° 47' S., and here we left our last depot 

 on the Barrier, called the Southern Barrier Depot, with a 

 week's ration for each returning party as usual. " The 

 man food is enough for one week for each returning unit 

 of four men, the next depot beyond being the Middle 

 Barrier Depot, 73 miles north. As we ought easily to do 

 over 100 miles a week on the return journey, there is little 

 likelihood of our having to go on short commons if all goes 

 well." x And this was what we all felt — until we found the 

 Polar Party. This was our twenty-seventh camp, and we 

 had been out a month. 



It was important that we should have fine clear weather 

 during the next few days when we should be approaching 

 the land. On his previous southern journey Scott had been 

 prevented from reaching the range of mountains which ran 

 along to our right by a huge chasm. This phenomenon is 

 known to geologists as a shear crack and is formed by the 



1 Bowers. 



