THE HEART OF THE ANTARCTIC 



lightened considerably for the first portion of the journey 

 when we started south. This southern depot was called 

 Depot A. 



The weather was bad and the temperature low on 

 the journey back, and I decided to take the outside 

 course in order to avoid the crevasses as much as pos- 

 sible. The disturbed condition of the ice in this neigh- 

 bourhood is caused by the Barrier impinging on the 

 Bluff, and by the glaciers coming down from Mount 

 Discovery. As had been the case on the outward 

 journey, we were delayed a good deal by blizzards, and 

 owing to this fact we had to make very long marches 

 when the weather was fine, for we had brought food 

 for twenty days only. We experienced a very severe 

 blizzard before we reached White Island. We had got 

 away from camp at 4 a.m. that morning, and had been 

 marching for about an hour and a half when the wind 

 that was following us began to approach blizzard 

 strength. Four men kept the traces taut while two 

 men held the sledge from behind, but even then the 

 sledge sometimes caught up to the men in front. As 

 the wind increased the drifting snow got thicker and 

 finer, and after a short time we could not see more than 

 ten or fifteen yards ahead. Then we found that we 

 were amongst crevasses, for first one man and then 

 another put his foot through a snow lid, and we there- 

 fore stopped and camped. The wind increased rapidly, 

 and it took about an hour and a half of hard work to 

 get the tents pitched. The snow blew into our faces 

 and formed masks of ice, and several members of the 

 party got bad frost-bites. When we finally got the 

 tents up, we had to lie in them for thirty hours. As a 

 result of such delays, we did not reach the old Discovery 

 winter quarters until October 13. We had been twenty- 



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