202 
SCOTT'S LAST EXPEDITION [February 
I pvit down to ice crystals falling, but this strange object 
demanded investigation. I ran forward a little, and the 
black spike was obviously the back fin of a killer whale, 
The creaking was really a warning that the bay ice was 
on the move. Meanwhile the ice I was on moved oS 
with a jolt, a mark of attention from the killer which we 
did not appreciate. However, I jumped the three-foot 
crack which resulted and we hastened to the fixed ice 
nearly two miles south. It was a case of ^ festina lente^ 
We could not drag the heavy sledges more than 2 miles 
an hour and were continually crossing cracks where the 
oozy snow and creaking showed how insecure was our 
passage. Soon after we reached the Butter Point pied- 
mont the whole bay ice moved off in great floes to the 
northward, so that seven miles of it had broken away 
since the ship landed us. It is quite impossible to tell 
whether sea ice is solid or not, for the first cracks are so 
small and the elevation of the eye so little that the only 
safe way to traverse sea ice in late summer is to keep off it ! 
We expected to find the Butter Point piedmont an 
easy level surface, but of its kind it was the worst I met 
with down South. All the afternoon we were plugging up 
an interminable snow slope. Just as one got one's foot 
braced to draw the sledges through the clinging snow, it 
would break through a crust and sink nearly to the knee. 
Then we would meet a few yards of firmer surface and 
bet whether we could make a dozen steps before the soft 
' mullock ' started again. Even worse was the jar when 
you expected deep snow and found a firm crust one inch 
below the surface. I carried a pedometer, and when 
