438 WORST JOURNEY IN THE WORLD 



clear to all. This was all the more necessary when, as we 

 shall see, the constant blizzards confined us week after 

 week to our hut. Even when we did get a fine day we were 

 almost entirely confined to the rocky cape for our exercise 

 and walks. When there was sea-ice it was most unsafe. 



Atkinson was in command : in addition, he and Dimitri 

 took over the care of the dogs. Many of these, both those 

 which had been out sledging and those just arrived, were 

 in a very poor state, and a dog hospital was soon built. At 

 this date we had 24 dogs left from the last year, and 1 1 

 dogs brought down recently by the ship : three of the new 

 dogs had already died. Lashly was in charge of the seven 

 mules, which were allotted to seven men for exercise : 

 Nelson was to continue his marine biological work: Wright 

 was to be meteorologist as well as chemist and physicist: 

 Gran was in charge of stores, and would help Wright in 

 the meteorological observations : Debenham was geolo- 

 gist and photographer. I was ordered to take a long rest, 

 but could do the zoological work, the South Polar Times, 

 and keep the Official Account of the Expedition from day 

 to day. Crean was in charge of sledging stores and equip- 

 ment. Archer was cook. Hooper, our domestic, took 

 over in addition the working of the acetylene plant. There 

 was plenty of work for our other two seamen, Keohane and 

 Williamson, in the daily life of the camp and in prepara- 

 tions for the sledging season to come. 



The blizzard which threatened us all the way from Hut 

 Point on May 1 broke soon after we got in. The ice in 

 North Bay, which had been frozen for some time, was 

 taken out on the first day of this blizzard, with the excep- 

 tion of a small strip running close along the shore. The 

 rest followed the next afternoon, when the wind was still 

 rising, and blew in the gusts up to 89 miles an hour. The 

 curious thing was that all this time the air had been quite 

 clear. 



This was the second day of the blizzard. The wind 

 continued in violence as the night wore on, and it began to 

 snow, becoming very thick. From 3 a.m. to 4 a.m. the 

 wind was so strong that there was a continuous rattle of 



