I 3 0 
THE STRAND MAGAZINE 1 
THIS MAP SHOWS THE MOVEMENTS OF THE EXPEDITION RELATED IN THE PRESENT INSTALMENT. 
ONE TON 
CAMP 
below - 30 0 .” Vet Scott, anxious to discover 
what effect such conditions had on the for- 
mation of new ice, “ took a walk to Cape 
Armitage” in the gale, and found the “sea 
a black cauldron covered with frost -smoke ; 
no ice can form in such weather.” 
The return, as cold, and calling for as much 
ice-craft as the outward journey, afforded one 
amusing and very human incident. Out on 
the sea-ice “ marched to Little Razor Back 
without halt, our own sledge dragging fear- 
fully. Crean said there was great difference 
in sledges, though loads were equal. Bowers 
politely assented when I voiced this senti- 
ment, hut I’m sure he and his parly thought 
it the plea of tired men. However, there was 
nothing like proof, and he readily consented 
to change sledges. The difference was really 
extraordinary. We felt the new sledge a 
featherweight compared with the old, and set 
up a great pace for the home quarters, regard- 
less of how much we perspired. We arrived 
at the II ut ten minutes ahead of the others, 
who were by this time quite convinced as to 
the difference in the sledges.” 
In Winter Quarters. 
It was now time to settle into winter 
quarters. St. George’s Day was the last 
day of the sun ; whereafter came only “ the 
long, mild twilight which, like a silver clasp, 
unites to-day and yesterday ; when morning 
and evening sit together hand in hand beneath 
the starless sky of midnight.” 
“ A theme for a pen,” he muses, “ would 
be the expansion of interest in Polar affairs. 
Compare the interests of a winter spent by 
the old Arctic voyagers with our own, and 
look into the causes. The aspect of everything 
changes as our knowledge expands.” Nor 
is this all ; he notes emphatically elsewhere, 
“ Science, the rock foundation of all effort.” 
Then follows another “ impression ” : “ The 
expansion of human interest in rude surround- 
ings may perhaps best be illustrated by com- 
parisons. It will serve to recall such a simple 
case as the fact that our ancestors applied 
the terms 4 horrid/ ‘ frightful,’ to mountain 
crags which in our own day are more justly 
admired as lofty, grand, and beautiful. The 
poetic conception of this natural phenomenon 
has followed not so much an inherent change 
of sentiment, as the intimacy of wider know- 
ledge and the death of superstitious influence. 
One is much struck by the importance of 
realizing limits.” 
These reflections seem to spring from the 
stimulating success of a very notable feature 
of the winter routine. Evening lectures, 
followed by discussions, were given three 
times a week. With so many experts in the 
most varied branches of pure science and the 
practical arts of travel there was no lack of 
material ; and the readiness to give of their 
best was only exceeded by the enthusiastic 
desire to receive. The unlearned found these 
high things to be lout the woof of their daily 
experience : and as for the learned, one day 
a biologist was overheard offering a geologist 
