igiT] UNSHELTERED IN THE STORM 53 
About now we began to realise that the roof must 
go. The stones holding the door end (leeward) of the 
roof began to work : drift was coming in, and the place 
where I had slit up the roof to fold it in over the door 
was obviously weak : the foodbags did something to 
remedy this. Bill told us he thought that to turn over, 
flaps under, would give us our best chance. We could 
do nothing, and lay in our bags until Birdie told us that 
the roof was flapping more : he was out of his bag trying 
to hold the rocks firm, and I and Bill were sitting up in 
ours pressing against them with a bamboo. Suddenly 
the roof went — first, I believe, over the door, splitting 
into seven or eight strips along the leeward end, and 
then ripping into hundreds of pieces in about half a 
minute. 
We got into our bags as best we could. I remember 
trying to get Bill into his, as he was farther out than 
I was ; he wouldn't let me — ' Please get into your bag, 
Cherry,' Both Birdie's hands went in getting back to 
his. We turned our bags over, flaps under, as much as 
possible, and were gradually drifted up. 
It was a most appalling position. I knew that Peary 
had once come through a blizzard lying in the open in 
his bag in the summer. I had no idea that human beings 
could do so in winter in the state in which wc were 
already. I wondered whether it was really worth trying 
to keep warm. I confess that I considered that wc were 
now come to the end. If we got out of the blizzard and 
had, as we decided, to try and get back by digging 
ourselves into the snow for the night, I meant to 
