Chapter £>iv 



THE SELECTION OF THE WINTER QUARTERS 



T T was with a heavy heart that I saw our bows swing- 

 ing round to the west, and realised that for a year at 

 least we would see nothing of the land which we had hoped 

 to have made our winter quarters. We turned to the 

 westward about eight o'clock that night, watching the ice 

 carefully as we went along, and up to one o'clock on 

 the morning of January 26 there was not a break in the 

 close-set pack to the northward of us. We then lost sight 

 of the ice in the mist. The glass was unsteady, and the 

 wind somewhat gusty from the south-west, with a choppy 

 sea. About six o'clock on the morning of the 26th, the 

 ship's head was put south, for I wanted to pick up the 

 Barrier and follow it along at least as far as the Western 

 Bight, before setting the course direct for Mount Erebus. 

 We passed the inlet we had seen on our way east, and about 

 twelve o'clock were abreast of the eastern point of West- 

 ern Bight. We now laid our course for Mount Erebus, 

 and as I hoped to examine the Barrier more closely in 

 the following year we made a direct course west, which 

 took us some distance off the edge of the ice. The 

 weather was fine and clear, excepting for a low stratus 

 cloud over the Barrier; this lifted later in the day, but 

 before evening we had entirely lost sight of the ice-face. 

 There was an extraordinary absence of bird-life of any 

 description, but whales were blowing all round us, some 

 coming right alongside the ship. We had so far seen 

 fewer of the snow petrels and many more of the Antarctic 

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