250 WORST JOURNEY IN THE WORLD 
found it only - 55°. “ Nowif we tell people that to get only 
87 degrees of frost can be an enormous relief they simply 
won’t believe us,”” | remember saying. Perhaps you won’t, 
but it was, all the same: and I wrote that night: “‘ ‘There 
is something after all rather good in doing something never 
done before.” Things were looking up, you see. 
Our hearts were doing very gallant work. Towards the 
end of the march they were getting beaten and were find- 
ing it dificult to pump the blood out to our extremities. 
There were few days that Wilson and I did not get some 
part of our feet frost-bitten. As we camped, I suspect our 
hearts were beating comparatively slowly and weakly. 
Nothing could be done until a hot drink was ready—tea 
for lunch, hot water for supper. Directly we started to 
drink then the effect was wonderful: it was, said Wilson, 
like putting a hot-water bottle against your heart. The 
beats became very rapid and strong and you felt the 
warmth travelling outwards and downwards. Then you 
got your foot-gear off—puttees (cut in half and wound 
round the bottom of the trousers), finnesko, saennegrass, 
hair socks, and two pairs of woollen socks. Then you 
nursed back your feet and tried to believe you were glad 
—a frost-bite does not hurt until it begins to thaw. Later 
came the blisters, and then the chunks of dead skin. 
Bill was anxious. It seems that Scott had twice gone 
for a walk with him during the Winter, and tried to per- 
suade him not to go, and only finally consented on con- 
dition that Bill brought us all back unharmed: we were 
Southern Journey men. Bill had a tremendous respect for 
Scott, and later when we were about to make an effort to 
get back home over the Barrier, and our case was very 
desperate, he was most anxious to leave no gear behind at 
Cape Crozier, even the scientific gear which could be of 
no use to us and of which we had plenty more at the hut. 
“Scott will never forgive me if I leave gear behind,’’ he 
said. It is a good sledging principle, and the party which 
does not follow it, or which leaves some of its load to be 
fetched in later is seldom a good one: but it is a principle 
which can be carried to excess. 
