234 
SCOTT'S LAST EXPEDITION [November 
large crevasses. We could see no open water within ten 
miles. 
On the 24th we got off at 9.30. I decided to try one 
sledge first and tack on the other if all went well. There 
was no wind and it was very hot. We could only just 
drag one sledge along and had only managed to get a 
mile northward by i p.m. Debenham had wrenched his 
knee, I sprained a leg muscle, and our progress was prac- 
tically nil. So I decided to pitch the tent and go in for 
night marching, when the temperature would be below 
freezing-point and the surface harden a little. A queer 
state of affairs ! I wrote : ' It was too hot to keep inside 
the sleeping-bags so I lay outside without a coat, in one 
pair of socks and finneskoes till about 6 — when Praise Be it 
got cooler ! ' 
Night marching commenced about 9 p.m. The surface 
was much better and as usual was best when a sort of 
' pancake patchwork ' of ice projected above the soft 
snow. We were never able to use the sail again and had 
to relay practically all the remainder of our journey. 
To the east appeared a brown island about 100 feet 
high and a quarter of a mile long. We hoped this had 
been missed by previous explorers, and while Debenham 
and I took angles with the plane table and theodolite the 
other two made a detour to examine our ' find.' Unfortu- 
nately it turned out to be a ' silt-berg '—a mass of ice 
filled with mud and moraine material. Many of the 
' doubtful islands ' marked on Polar charts no doubt 
originated in the same way. 
We had so far had neither time nor opportunity to 
