SOUTH 
the sea whenever the weather was cahn, and it had been broken 
up and taken out many times by the blizzards. During the 
next few days eager eyes looked seaward through the dim 
twilight of noon, but the sea was covered with a dense black 
mist and nothing was visible. A northerly wind sprang up 
on May 8 and continued for a few hours, but it brought no sign 
of the ship, and when on May 10 the most violent blizzard yet 
experienced by the party commenced, hope grew slender. The 
gale continued for three days, the wind attainmg a velocity of 
seventy miles an horn-. The snow-drift was very thick and the 
temperature fell to - 20° Fahr. The shore party took a gloomy 
view of the ship's chances of safety among the ice-floes of the 
Ross Sea under such conditions. 
Stevens and his companions made a careful survey of their 
position and realized that they had serious difficulties to face. 
No general provisions and no clothing of the kind required for 
sledging had been landed from the ship. Much of the sledging 
gear was also aboard. Fortunately, the hut contained both 
food and clothing, left there by Captain Scott's Expedition. 
The men killed as many seals as possible and stored the meat 
and blubber. June 2 brought a welcome addition to the party 
in the form of the men who had been forced to remain at Hut 
Point until the sea-ice became firm. Mackintosh and those 
with him had incurred some risk in making the crossing, since 
open water had been seen on their route by the Cape Evans 
party only a short time before. There were now ten men at 
Cape Evans — namely. Mackintosh, Spencer-Smith, Joyce, Wild, 
Cope, Stevens, Hayward, Gaze, Jack, and Richards. The 
winter had closed down upon the Antarctic and the party would 
not be able to make any move before the beginning of September, 
In the meantime they overhauled the available stores and 
gear, made plans for the work of the forthcoming spring and 
summer, and lived the severe but not altogether unhappy life 
of the polar explorer in winter quarters. Mackintosh, writing 
on June 5, surveyed his position : 
The decision of Stenhouse to make this bay the wintering- 
place of the ship was not reached without much thought and 
consideration of all eventualities. Stenhouse had already tried 
266 
