Part 31 (1/2)
After going five miles I had miraculous good fortune.
I was travelling along on an even down grade and was wondering how long the two pounds of food which remained would last, when something dark loomed through the drift a short distance away to the right. All sorts of possibilities fled through my mind as I headed the sledge for it. The unexpected happened--it was a cairn of snow erected by McLean, Hodgeman and Hurley, who had been out searching for us. On the top of the mound was a bag of food, left on the chance that it might be picked up, while in a tin was a note stating the bearing and distance of the mound from Aladdin's Cave (E. 30 degrees S., distance twenty-three miles), that the s.h.i.+p had arrived at the Hut and was waiting, that Amundsen had reached the Pole, and that Scott was remaining another year in Antarctica.
It was rather a singular fact that the search party only left this mound at eight o'clock on the morning of that very day (January 29). It was about 2 P.M. when I found it. Thus, during the night of the 28th, our camps had been only about five miles apart.
With plenty of food, I speedily felt stimulated and revived, and antic.i.p.ated reaching the Hut in a day or two, for there was then not more than twenty-three miles to cover. Alas, however, there was to be another delay. I was without crampons--they had been thrown away on the western side of Mertz Glacier--and in the strong wind was not able to stand up on the slippery ice of the coastal slopes. The result was that I sat on the sledge and ran along with the wind, nibbling at the food as I went. The sledge made so much leeway that near the end of the day, after fourteen miles, I reckoned that I had been carried to the east of Aladdin's Cave. The course was therefore changed to the west, but the wind came down almost broadside-on to the sledge, and it was swept away.
The only thing to do was to camp.
On the 30th I cut up the box of the theodolite and into two pieces of wood stuck as many screws and tacks as I could procure from the sledge-meter. In the repair-bag there were still a few ice-nails which at this time were of great use. Late in the day the wind fell off, and I started westward over the ice-slopes with the pieces of nail-studded wood lashed to my feet.
After six miles these improvised crampons broke up, and the increasing wind got me into difficulties. Finally, the sledge slipped sideways into a narrow creva.s.se and was caught by the boom (which crossed from side to side at the lower part of the mast). I was not strong enough for the job of extricating it straight away, and by the time I had got it safely on the ice, the wind had increased still more. So I pitched camp.
The blizzard was in full career on January 31 and I spent all day and until late at night trying to make the crampons serviceable, but without success.
On February 1 the wind and drift subsided late in the afternoon, and I clearly saw to the west the beacon which marked Aladdin's Cave.
At 7 P.M. I reached this haven within the ice, and never again was I to have the ordeal of pitching the tent. Inside the cave were three oranges and a pineapple which had been brought from the s.h.i.+p. It was wonderful once more to be in the land of such things!
I waited to mend one of the crampons and then started off for the Hut; but a blizzard had commenced. To descend the five miles of steep icy slopes with my miserable crampons, in the weak state in which I found myself, would only have been as a last resort. So I camped in the comfortable cave and hoped for better weather next day.
The high wind, rising to a hurricane at times, continued for a whole week with dense drift until the 8th. I spent the long hours making crampons of a new pattern, eating and sleeping. Eventually I became so anxious that I used to sit outside the cave for long spells, watching for a lull in the wind.
At length I resolved to go down in the blizzard, sitting on the sledge as long as possible, blown along by the wind. I was making preparations for a start when the wind suddenly decreased and my opportunity had come.
In a couple of hours I was within one mile and a half of the Hut. There was no sign of the s.h.i.+p lying in the offing, but I comforted myself with the thought that she might be still at the anchorage and have swung insh.o.r.e so as to be hidden by the ice-cliffs, or on the other hand that Captain Davis might have been along the coast to the east searching there.
But even as I gazed about seeking for a clue, a speck on the north-west horizon caught my eye and my hopes went down. It looked like a distant s.h.i.+p; it might well have been the 'Aurora'. Well, what matter! the long journey was at an end-a terrible chapter of my life was finished!
Then the rocks around Winter Quarters began to come into view, part of the basin of the boat harbour appeared, and lo! there were human figures! They almost seemed unreal--I was in a dream--but after a brief moment one of them saw me and waved an arm, I replied, there was a commotion and they all ran towards the Hut. Then they were lost, for the crest of the first steep slope hid them. It almost seemed to me that they had run away to hide.
Minutes pa.s.sed, and I slowly went along with the sledge. Then a head rose over the brow of the hill and there was Bickerton, breathless after a long run. I expect he considered for a while which one of us it was.
Soon we had shaken hands and he knew all in a few brief words, and I learned that the s.h.i.+p had left earlier in the day. Madigan, McLean, Bage and Hodgeman arrived, and then a new-comer--Jeffryes. Five men had remained behind to make a search for our party, and Jeffryes was a new wireless operator brought down by Captain Davis.
We were soon at the Hut where I found that full preparations had been made for wintering a second year. The weather was calm and the s.h.i.+p was no distance away so I decided to recall her by wireless. The masts at the Hut had been re-erected during the summer, and on board the 'Aurora'
Hannam was provided with a wireless receiving set. Jeffryes had arranged with Hannam to call up at 8, 9 and 10 P.M. for several evenings while the 'Aurora' was ”within range” in case there were any news of my party.
A message recalling the s.h.i.+p was therefore sent off and repeated at frequent intervals till past midnight.
Next morning there was a forty-mile wind when we went outside, but away across Commonwealth Bay to the west the 'Aurora' could be seen close to the face of the ice-cliffs. She had returned in response to the call and was steaming up and down, waiting for the wind to moderate.
We immediately set to work getting all the records, instruments and personal gear ready to be taken down to the boat harbour in antic.i.p.ation of calm weather during the day.
The wind chose to continue and towards evening was in the sixties, while the barometer fell. During the afternoon Hodgeman went across to the western ridge and saw that the s.h.i.+p was still in the Bay. The sea was so heavy that the motor-boat could never have lived through it.
That night Jeffryes sent another message, which we learned afterwards was not received, in which Captain Davis was given the option of remaining until calm weather supervened or of leaving at once for the Western Base. I felt that the decision should be left to him, as he could appreciate exactly the situation of the Western Base and what the s.h.i.+p could be expected to do amid the ice at that season of the year.
The time was already past when, according to my written instructions left for him on arrival at Commonwealth Bay, the 'Aurora' should sail west to relieve Wild and his party.
On the morning of the 10th there was no sign of the s.h.i.+p and evidently Captain Davis had decided to wait no longer, knowing that further delay would endanger the chances of picking up the eight men who had elected to winter on the shelf-ice one thousand five hundred miles to the west. At such a critical moment determination, fearless and swift, was necessary, and, in coming to his momentous decision, Captain Davis acted well and for the best interests of the Expedition.