SOUTH 
hours of the night. A cross-sea was running and I could not 
feel sure that all was well with the missing boat The waves 
could not be seen in the darkness, though the direction and 
force of the wind could be felt, and under such conditions, in 
an open boat, disaster might overtake the most experienced 
navigator. I flashed our compass-lamp on the sail in the hope 
that the signal would be visible on board the Dudley Docker, but 
could see no reply. We strained our eyes to windward in the 
darkness in the hope of catching a return signal and repeated 
our flashes at intervals. 
My anxiety, as a matter of fact, was groundless, I will quote 
Worsley's own account of what happened to the Dudley Docker : 
About midnight we lost sight of the James Caird with the 
Stancomh Wills in tow, but not long after saw the light of the 
Jarnes Caird' s compass-lamp, which Sir Ernest was flashing 
on their sail as a guide to us. We answered by lighting our 
candle under the tent and letting the light shine through. 
At the same time we got the direction of the wind and how 
we were hauling from my little pocket-compass, the boat's 
compass being smashed. With this candle our poor fellows 
lit their pipes, their only solace, as our raging thirst prevented 
us from eating anything. By this time we had got into a bad 
tide-rip, which, combined with the heavy, lumpy sea, made it 
almost mipossible to keep the Dudley Docker from swamping. 
As it was we shipped several bad seas over the stern as well 
as abeam and over the bows, although we were ' on a 
wind.' Lees, who owned himself to be a rotten oarsman, 
made good here by strenuous baling, in which he was well 
seconded by Cheetham. Greenstreet, a splendid fellow, re- 
lieved me at the tiller and helped generally. He and Macklin 
were my right and left bowers as stroke-oars throughout. 
McLeod and Cheetham were two good sailors and oars, the 
former a typical old deep-sea salt and growler, the latter a 
pirate to his finger-tips. In the height of the gale that night 
Cheetham was buying matches from me for bottles of cham- 
pagne, one bottle per match (too cheap ; I should have charged 
him tAVO bottles). The champagne is to be paid when he opens 
his ' pub ' in Hull and I am able to call that way. . . . We 
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