MAKING OUR EASTING DOWN 41 
It was expected that the topgallant mast would go, but 
nothing could be done while the full fury of the wind 
lasted. Campbell paced quietly up and down the bridge 
with a smile on his face. The watch was grouped round 
the ratlines ready to go aloft, and Crean volunteered to go 
up alone and try and free the yard, but permission was 
refused. It was touch and go with the mast and there was 
nothing to be done. 
The squall passed, the sail was freed and furled, and the 
next big squall found us ready to lower upper topsails and 
all was well. Finally the damage was a split sail and a 
strained mast. 
The next morning a new topgallant sail was bent, but 
quite the biggest hailstorm I have ever seen came on in 
the middle of the operation. Much of the hail must have 
been inches in circumference, and hurt even through 
thick clothes and oilskins. At the same time there were 
several waterspouts formed. The men on the topgallant 
yard had a beastly time. Below on deck men made hail- 
balls and pretended they were snow. 
From now onwards we ran on our course before a gale. 
By the early morning of October 12 Cape Otway light was 
in sight. Working double tides in the engine-room, and 
with every stitch of sail set, we just failed to reach Port 
Phillip Heads by mid-day, when the tide turned, and it 
was impossible to get through. We went up Melbourne 
Harbour that evening, very dark and blowing hard. 
A telegram was waiting for Scott : 
“Madeira. Am going South. AMuNDsEN.”’ 
This telegram was dramatically important, as will appear 
when we come to the last act of the tragedy. Captain Roald 
Amundsen was one of the most notable of living explorers, 
and was in the prime of life—forty-one, two years younger 
than Scott. He had been in the Antarctic before Scott, 
with the Belgica Expedition in 1897-99, and therefore did 
hot consider the South Pole in any sense our property. 
Since then he had realized the dream of centuries of ex- 
ploration by passing through the North-West Passage, 
