306 FROM EDINBURGH TO THE ANTARCTIC 
us and we ran it through the ffipper-holes in the skins ; 
then the boat backed off, and the skins slipped down over 
the ice-edge with a flop into the water and were pulled 
over the boat's side. 
We nearly came to grief getting into the boat. She 
was backed in very gingerly, bow first, and just as we 
were jumping the surge drove her in too close, the bow 
caught under a ledge, and the stern went up in the air, 
and tumbled us all in a heap, half-drowned in a 
smother of foam. An ordinary boat would have been 
smashed in pieces, but these whale-boats we use for sealing 
are very strong. 
As the next seals in sight were a long way off, we for 
once had time to get dinner on board. The moment it 
was swallowed we were lowered away again to get them. 
They were the big black seals this time, and lay scat- 
tered over a stream of ice a long way out from the main 
pack. 
We never see these large seals in great numbers, gener- 
ally In couples, or singly. In this case they lay well into 
the centre of the stream, and though we could push our 
way through the ice ruins to within a few yards of them, 
we could not always manage to get them into the boat. 
All the afternoon we spent shoving and pulling in and out 
amongst the blocks. At times the boat was jammed 
out of water, and do what we would we could make no 
progress. For hours we only made a few yards, and once 
free became immediately entangled again in another white 
labyrinth in our attempts to get to some big seal that lay 
sleeping, perhaps within a boat's length, and yet was as 
