REVIEW OF THE JOURNEY 



in view of the wide lanes of open water in the sea ice 

 on the south side of the Drygalski Glacier, when we 

 reached it on November 30, that we got to glades firma 

 only in the nick of time. 



Then there was the formidable obstacle of the 

 Drygalski Glacier, with its wide and deep chasms, its 

 steep ridges and crevasses, the passage of this glacier 

 proving so difficult that although only a little over 

 twenty miles in width it took us a fortnight to get 

 across. On the far side of the Drygalski was the open 

 sea forcing us to travel shorewards over the glacier 

 surface. Then had come the difficult task of pioneering 

 a way up to the high plateau — ^the attempt to force a 

 passage up the Mount Nansen Glacier — our narrow 

 escapes from having our sledge engulfed in crevasses — 

 the heavy blizzard with deep new fallen snow and 

 then our retreat from that region of high-pressure ridges 

 and crevasse entanglements — our abandonment of the 

 proposed route up the snout of the Bellingshausen 

 Glacier, and finally our successful ascent up the small 

 tributary glacier, the " backstairs passage," to the south 

 of Mount Larsen. 



On the high plateau was the difficulty of respira- 

 tion, biting winds with low temperatures, difficult 

 sledging — sometimes against blizzards — over broad 

 undulations and high sastrugi, the cracking of our lips, 

 fingers and feet, exhaustion from insufficient rations, 

 disappointment at finding that the Magnetic Pole 

 had shifted further inland than the position previously 

 assigned to it. Then, after we had just succeeded by 

 dint of great efforts in reaching the Pole of verticity, 

 came the necessity for forced marches, with our sledge, 

 of from sixteen to twenty miles a day in order to reach 

 the coast with any reasonable prospect of our being 

 picked up by the Nimrod. 



219 



