THE HEART OF THE ANTARCTIC 



Then came our choice of the difficult route down the 

 snout of the BelHngshausen Glacier, and our conse- 

 quent difficulties in surmounting the ice-pressure ridges; 

 then the difficulty of sledging over the " tile-ice " sur- 

 face, the opposing ice barrancas formed by the thaw 

 water while we were on the high plateau; the final 

 heavy snow blizzard; our loss of direction when sledg- 

 ing in bad hght and falling snow, and finally our arrest 

 by the deep barranca of what afterwards was known as 

 Rehef Inlet. 



But ours were not the only, nor the greatest, diffi- 

 culties connected with our journey. There were many 

 disappointments, dangers and hardships for the captain, 

 officers and crew of the Nimrod in their search for us 

 along that two hundred miles of desolate and, for a great 

 part, inaccessible coast-line. How often black spots 

 ashore, proving on nearer view to be seals or penguins, 

 had been mistaken for depot flags; how often the glint 

 of sunhght off brightly reflecting facets of ice had been 

 thought to be " helios," only the disappointed ones 

 can tell; how often, too, the ship was all but aground, 

 at other times all but beset in the ice-pack in the efforts 

 to get a clearer view of the shore-line in order to discover 

 our depot ! This is a tale that the brave men who risked 

 their lives to save ours will scorn to tell, but is nevertheless 

 true. 



As the result of our journey to the Magnetic Pole 

 and back, Mawson was able to join up in his continuous 

 triangulation survey. Mount Erebus with Mount Mel- 

 bourne, and to show with approximate accuracy the 

 outline of the coast-line, and the position and height of 

 several new mountains. He and I obtained geological 

 collections, sketches and notes — especially on glacial 

 geology — along the coast-line, and he also took a series 



220 



