THE STRAND MAGAZINE . 
to return through storm and cold to Hut 
Point, so heavy a struggle that he was 
prostrated with a strained heart, his com- 
panion knocked up, and the dogs frostbitten 
and ill. 
The Last Fatal Blizzard. 
Even in this extremity the strong wills of 
the Southern party might have compelled 
them across those weary eleven miles, borne 
on for a couple of days more by sheer deter- 
calmlv-weighed justification of his enterprise, 
which rings with the simplicity and sincerity 
of his own life. 
MESSAGE TO THE PUBLIC . 
The causes of the disaster are not due to * 
faulty organization, but to misfortune in all risks 
which had to be undertaken. 
i. The loss of pony transport in March , 1911, 
obliged me to start later than 1 had 
intended and obliged the limits of stuff 
transported to be narrowed 
CAPTAIN SCOTT’S JOURNALS IN THE WRAPPER IN WHICH THEY WERE CARRIED. 
From a Photograph. 
mination than by the unsatisfying sustenance 
of cold rations. But an unhearcl-of blizzard 
descended upon them which lasted nine days. 
To go out in a blizzard is to be instantly 
robbed of breath, to be half stupefied by the 
battery of hurricane wind and whirling snow 
particles, to wander away hopelessly from 
tracks and direction. 
Expecting the storm to lull after the usual 
interval, a “ forlorn hope 75 was resolved upon 
after a couple of days. Bowers and Wilson 
were to push on for supplies and fuel. But 
day after day the blizzard held them prisoners. 
The final resolve was to start, if a start could 
be made, “ and die in their tracks. 7 ’ But to 
stir out was impossible. 
Still on the 29th, the last date given, the 
blizzard continued to rage. “ Every day we 
have been ready to start for our depot, eleven 
miles away, but outside the door of the tent 
it remains a scene of whirling drift. I do not 
think we can hope for any better things now.” 
And in the quiet of their frail shelter Scott 
wrote firmly, clearly, without faltering or 
erasure, that Message to the Public, with its 
2. The weather throughout the outward journey, 
and especially the long gale in S WS'., 
stopped us. 
3. The soft snoiv in lower reaches of Glacier 
again reduced pace. 
We fought these untoward events with a will 
and conquered, but it cut- into our provision 
reserve. 
Every detail of our food supplies, clothing, and 
depots, made on the interior ice-sheet and over that 
long stretch of seven hundred, miles to the Pole 
and back, worked out to perfection. The advance 
party would have returned to the Glacier in fine 
form and with surplus of food, but for the astonish- 
ing failure of the man w/iom we least expected to 
fail. Edgar Evans was thought the strongest man 
of the- party. 
The Beardmore Glacier is not difficult in fine 
weather , but on our return we did not get a single 
completely fine day. This with a sick com- 
panion enormously increased our anxieties. 
As I have said elsewhere, we got into fright- 
fully rough ice, and Edgar Evans received a con- 
cussion of the brain. He died a natural death, 
but left us a shaken party, with the season unduly 
advanced. 
