158 WORST JOURNEY IN THE WORLD 
This hut was built by the Discovery Expedition, who — 
themselves lived in the ship which lay off the shore frozen 
into the sea-ice, as a workroom and as a refuge in case of 
shipwreck. It was useful to them in some ways, but was 
too large to heat with the amount of coal available, and 
was rather a white elephant. Scott wrote of it that “on the — 
whole our large hut has been and will be of use to us, but 
its uses are never likely to be of such importance as to | 
render it indispensable, nor cause it to be said that circum- 
stances have justified the outlay made on it, or the expen- 
diture of space and trouble in bringing it to its final home, — 
It is here now, however, and here it will stand for many a 
long year with such supplies as will afford the necessaries 
of life to any less fortunate party who may follow in our — 
footsteps and be forced to search for food and shelter.” 1 
Well! It was to be more useful to Scott in 1910 to 
1913 than he imagined in 1902. We found the place with 
its verandah complete, the remains of the two magnetic — 
huts and a rubbish heap. It was wonderful what that rub-— 
bish heap yielded up. Bricks to build a blubber stove, a 
sheet of iron to put over the top of it, a length of stove 
piping to form a chimney. Somehow somebody made 
cement, and built the bricks together, and one of the 
magnetic huts gave up its asbestos sheeting to insulate the 
chimney from the woodwork of the roofs. An old door 
made a cook’s table, old cases turned upside down made 
seats. The provisions left by the Discovery were biscuits 
contained in some fortylarge packing cases. These we piled - 
up across the middle of our house as a bulkhead and the 
old Discovery winter awning was dug out of thesnowoutside - 
and fixed against the wall thus made to keep the warmth in. 
At night we cleared the floor space and spread our bags. 
The two precious survivors of the eight ponies with 
which we started on our journey were housed in the ver- | 
andah, which was made wind-proof and snow-proof. | 
The more truculent dogs lay tethered outside, the more) 
docile were allowed their freedom, but even so the dog | 
fights were not infrequent. We had one poor little dog, 
1 Scott, The Voyage of the Discovery, vol. i. p. 350. 
