CLIMBING THE PLATEAU 



addition to the climbing, travelled that day about four 

 miles. The plateau wind had almost gone, and once 

 more we revelled in being not only high, but dry. 

 Having no other kind of Christmas gift to offer, Mawson 

 and I presented Mackay with some sennegrass for his 

 pipe, his tobacco having long ago given out. We slept 

 soundly that Christmas night. 



On December 26 we observed dense dark snow clouds 

 to the north-east, and a little light snow commenced to 

 fall, but fortunately the weather cleared towards the 

 afternoon. Mawson lost one of his blue sweaters off the 

 sledge, but he and Mackay went back some distance and 

 recovered it. Towards the afternoon we found it neces- 

 sary to cross a number of fairly large crevasses. These 

 were completed snowed over, and although we frequently 

 fell through up to our knees, we had no serious trouble 

 from them on this occasion. Some of them were from 

 twenty to thirty feet in width, and it was fortunate for 

 us that the snow lids were strong enough to carry 

 safely the sledge and ourselves. Mackay suggested, for 

 greater security, fastening the Alpine rope around 

 Mawson, who was in the lead, and securing the other 

 end of it to the sledge. The rope was left just slack 

 enough to admit of the strain of hauling being taken 

 by the harness rope, hence Mawson had two strings 

 to his bow in case of being suddenly precipitated 

 into a crevasse. This was a good system, which 

 we always adopted afterwards in crossing heavily 

 crevassed ice. 



The following day, December 27, we decided to 

 make a small depot of our ski-boots (as by this time it 

 appeared we were getting off the glacier ice on to hard 

 snow and neve where we should not require them) and 

 also of all our geological specimens, and about one day's 

 food-supply, together with a small quantity of oil — a 



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