SOUTHWARD 51 
coal sacks for long. There was nothing for it but to grapple 
with the evil, and nearly all hands were labouring for hours 
in the waist of the ship, heaving coal sacks overboard and 
re-lashing the petrol cases, etc., in the best manner possible 
under such difficult and dangerous circumstances. The 
seas were continually breaking over these people and now 
and again they would be completely submerged. At such 
times they had to cling for dear life to some fixture to pre- 
vent themselves being washed overboard, and with coal 
bags and loose cases washing about, there was every risk of 
such hold being torn away. 
“No sooner was some semblance of order restored than 
someexceptionally heavy wave would tear away the lashing, 
and the work had to be done all over again.” 4 
The conditions became much worse during the night 
and things werecomplicated for some of us by sea-sickness. 
I have lively recollections of being aloft for two hours in 
the morning watch on Friday and being sick at intervals all 
the time. For sheer downright misery give mea hurricane, 
not too warm, the yard of a sailing ship, a wet sail and a 
bout of sea-sickness. 
It must have been about this time that orders were 
given to clew up the jib and then to furl it. Bowers and 
four others went out on the bowsprit, being buried deep in 
the enormous seas every time the ship plunged her nose 
into them with great force. It was an education to see him 
lead those men out into that roaring inferno. He has left 
his own vivid impression of this gale ina letter home. His 
tendency was always to underestimate difficulties, whether 
the force of wind in a blizzard, or the troubles of a polar 
traveller. ‘This should be remembered when reading the 
vivid accounts which his mother has so kindly given me 
permission to use: 
“We got through the forties with splendid speed and 
were just over the fifties when one of those tremendous 
gales got us. Our Lat. was about 52° S., a part of the world 
absolutely unfrequented by shipping of any sort, and as 
we had already been blown off Campbell Island we had 
1 Scott’s Last Expedition, vol. i. pp. 11-12. 
