338 
FROM EDINBURGH TO THE ANTARCTIC 
Land, all close together. Some of the crews were busy 
shooting more seals, and the rest were on board, slashing 
away at the blubber and skins on deck, making off against 
time, and I have no doubt envying us with their whole 
hearts. The last farewell cheer we gave to the Antarctic 
before we turned the broad of our backs on it, and our 
faces towards home, was a little to the north of the vessels, 
when we came on one of the Diana's boats out sealing. 
The crew had just jumped on to the ice to kill a seal, 
when we passed. The harpooneer fired three shots before 
he killed it, in such haste was he to wave a farewell. He 
and his mates and a couple of penguins scrambled up 
a hummock ; the men gave a cheer, and the penguins 
waved their flippers, and toddled down the snow again 
and popped under water. 
And so we turned from the mystery of the Antarctic, 
with all its white-bound secrets still unread, as if we had 
stood before ancient volumes that told of the past and 
the beginning of all things, and had not opened them ^ 
read. Now we go home to the world that is worn down 
with the feet of many people, to gnaw in our discontent 
the memory of what we could have done, but did not do. 
Saturday Night. — We have had just a glimpse of land 
to the northward before the night fell — Clarence Island, 
the most easterly of the South Shetlands. The pack-ice is 
out of sight now, only a few scattered bergs and broken 
pieces of sea-worn berg ice remain. The wind is pleasant 
and warm, N. by W., so we are steaming with only fore 
and aft sails set. In the engine-room, our social centre 
