A NEW ROUTE 



a long rest. By securing the so much needed additional 

 food-supply, he had rendered us an extremely important 

 service. It now, of course, became necessary to give 

 him the needed rest on the following day. Accordingly, 

 the earlier part of December 6 we spent in the sleeping- 

 bag. 



Soon after midnight, December 5-6, we left our camp 

 on the south side of the Drykalski Glacier, and struck 

 across the high ridges of blue ice into the small valley 

 in the glacier which we had prospected two days pre- 

 viously. As usual a keen wind was blowing off the 

 plateau at this time of the morning, but the tempera- 

 ture soon rose to plus 23° Fahr. at 7.15 a.m. The sky 

 was overcast with heavy stratus and cumulus clouds, 

 especially in the direction of Cape Washington. We 

 passed over a considerable number of crevasses without 

 any serious accident. The day's sledging was heavy 

 on account of the strongly undulating surface of the 

 ice and the quantity of soft snow in the ice valley on the 

 surface of the Drygalski Glacier. 



The following day, December 7, was also dull and 

 lowering with very dense cumulus clouds over Cape 

 Washington and Mounts Melbourne and Nansen. We 

 inferred that this dense cumulus was due to the presence 

 of open water between the Drygalski Glacier and Cape 

 Washington, and were not a little anxious as to whether, 

 in the event of the sea ice having all drifted out on the 

 north side of the Drygalski Glacier, it would be possible 

 for us to travel shorewards on the surface of the glacier 

 itself, when we got to the other side. We encountered 

 many precipitous slopes from thirty to forty feet deep, 

 often with overhanging cornices, barring our northward 

 progress like those already met with in the part of 

 the glacier from which we had retreated. These over- 



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