Ix WORST JOURNEY JUIN THE WORE 
the Terra Nova which follow. With an object which I will 
explain presently I quote a review of Scott’s book from the 
pen of one of Mr. Punch’s staff: 
“There is courage and strength and loyalty and love 
shining out of the second volume no less than out of the 
first; there were gallant gentlemen who lived as well as 
gallant gentlemen who died ; but it is the story of Scott, 
told by himself, which will give the book a place among 
the great books of the world. That story begins in Novem- 
ber 1910, and ends on March 29, 1912, and it is because 
when you come to the end, you will have lived with Scott 
for sixteen months, that you will not be able to read the 
last pages without tears. That message to the public was 
heartrending enough when it first came to us, but it was 
as the story of how a great hero fell that we read it; now 
it is just the tale of how a dear friend died. To have read 
this book is to have known Scott ; and if I were asked to 
describe him, I think I should use some such words as 
those which, six months before he died, he used of the 
gallant gentleman who went with him, ‘ Bill’ Wilson. 
‘Words must always fail when I talk of him,’ he wrote ; 
‘I believe he is the finest character 1 ever met—the closer 
one gets to him the more there is to admire. Every quality 
is so solid and dependable. Whatever the matter, one 
knows Bill will be sound, shrewdly practical, intensely 
loyal, and quite unselfish.’ That is true of Wilson, if Scott 
says so, for he knew men; but most of it is also true of 
Scott himself. I have never met a more beautiful character 
than that which is revealed unconsciously in these journals. 
His humanity, his courage, his faith, his steadfastness, 
above all, his simplicity, mark him as a man among men. 
It is because of his simplicity that his last message, the last 
entries in his diary, his last letters, are of such undying 
beauty. The letter of consolation (and almost of apology) 
which, on the verge of death, he wrote to Mrs. Wilson, 
wife of the man dying at his side, may well be Scott’s 
monument. He could have no finer. And he has raised a 
monument for those other gallant gentlemen who died— 
1 A. A. Milne. 
