134 WORST JOURNEY IN THE WORLD 
ten dogs, each team working one day out of two. Their 
dogs stop at a whistle, and if they make a break they can be 
stopped by overturning the sledge, empty or full as the 
case may be. They are nine in the shore party and ten in | 
the ship. Their ship is going back to Buenos Ayres with | 
Nilsen in charge and during the winter is to encircle the 
world, sounding all the way. | 
“They are not starting on the dash South this year and | 
do not yet know whether they will lay depéts this year, | 
They have 116 dogs and ten of these are bitches, so that _ 
they can rear pups, and have done so very successfully on | 
the way out. The Fram acts like a cork in the sea; she rolls | 
tremendously but does not ship water, and during the » 
voyage they have had the dogs running loose about the 
decks. There is a lot more miscellaneous information, but 
I may remember it more coherently a little later when 
the main impressions of the rencontre are a little more 
fauat. } 
It will be seen that Priestley missed three points. First, 
he was left with a conventional but very erroneous impres- 
sionof Amundsenasa blunt Norwegian sailor, not in theleast 
an intellectual. Second, he thought Amundsen had camped 
on the ice and not on terra firma. Third, he thought Am- 
undsen was going to the Pole by the old route over the | 
Beardmore. The truth was that Amundsen was an ex- 
plorer of the markedly intellectual type, rather Jewish than 
Scandinavian, who had proved his sagacity by discovering — 
solid footing for the winter by pure judgment. For the » 
moment, let it be confessed, we all underrated Amundsen, _ 
and could not shake off the feeling that he had stolen a | 
march on us. 
Back to McMurdo Sound, and the news left at Hut | 
Point. Then the two ponies which had been allotted to 
Campbell were swum ashore at Cape Evans, since he | 
thought that now they would be of more use to ‘Scott than 
to himself. Subsequent events proved the extreme useful- | 
ness of this unselfish act. The Terra Nova would steam | 
north and try and land Campbell’s party on the extreme | 
1 Priestley’s diary. * | 
