THE HEART OF THE ANTARCTIC 



arrayed against us the strongest forces of nature. This 

 cutting south wind with drift plays the mischief with us, 

 and after ten hours of struggling against it one pannikin 

 of food with two biscuits and a cup of cocoa does 

 not warm one up much. I must think over the situ- 

 ation carefully to-morrow, for time is going on and food 

 is going also. 



January 3. — Started at 6.55 a.m., cloudy but fairly 

 warm. The temperature was minus 8° Fahr. at noon. 

 We had a terrible surface all the morning, and did only 

 5 miles 100 yards. A meridian altitude gave us latitude 

 87° 22' South at noon. The surface was better in the 

 afternoon, and we did 6 geographical miles. The 

 temperature at 6 p.m. was minus 11° Fahr. It was 

 an uphill pull towards the evening, and we camped at 

 6.20 p.m., the altitude being 11,220 ft. above the sea. 

 To-morrow we must risk making a depot on the 

 plateau, and make a dash for it, but even then, if 

 this surface continues, we will be two weeks in carrying 

 it through. 



January 4.— The end is in sight. We can only go 

 for three more days at the most, for we are weakening 

 rapidly. Short food and a blizzard wind from the south, 

 with driving drift, at a temperature of 47° of frost, have 

 plainly told us to-day that we are reaching our limit, for 

 we were so done up at noon with cold that the clinical 

 thermometer failed to register the temperature of three of 

 us at 94 degrees. We started at 7.40 a.m. leaving a depot 

 on this great wide plateau, a risk that only this case justi- 

 fied, and one that my comrades agreed to, as they have 

 to every one so far, with the same cheerfulness and regard- 

 lessness of self that have been the means of our getting as 

 far as we have done so far. Pathetically small looked the 

 bamboo, one of the tent poles, with a bit of bag sown on 

 as a flag, to mark our stock of provisions, which has 



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