Part 25 (1/2)
Writing in the evening Scott said, 'Wilson thinks the ponies finished, but Oates thinks they will get another march in spite of the surface, _if it comes to-morrow_. If it should not, we must kill the ponies to-morrow and get on as best we can with the men on ski and the dogs. But one wonders what the dogs can do on such a surface. I much fear they also will prove inadequate. Oh! for fine weather, if only to the Glacier.'
By 11 P.M. the wind had gone to the north, and the sky at last began really to break. The temperature also helped matters by falling to +26, and in consequence the water nuisance began to abate; and at the prospect of action on the following morning cheerful sounds were once more heard in the camp. 'The poor ponies look wistfully for the food of which so very little remains, yet they are not hungry, as recent savings have resulted from food left in their nose-bags. They look wonderfully fit, all things [Page 352]
considered. Everything looks more hopeful to-night, but nothing can recall four lost days.' During the night Scott turned out two or three times to find the weather slowly improving, and at 8 o'clock on December 9 they started upon a most terrible march to Camp 31.
The tremendous snowfall had made the surface intolerably soft, and the half-fed animals sank deeper and deeper. None of them could be led for more than a few minutes, but if they were allowed to follow the poor beasts did fairly well. Soon, however, it began to seem as if no real headway could be made, and so the man-haulers were pressed into the service to try and improve matters.
Bowers and Cherry-Garrard went ahead with one 10-foot sledge and made a track--thus most painfully a mile or so was gained. Then when it seemed as if the limit had been reached P.O. Evans saved the situation by putting the last pair of snow-shoes upon s.n.a.t.c.her, who at once began to go on without much pressure, and was followed by the other ponies.
No halt was made for lunch, but after three or four laborious miles they found themselves engulfed in pressures which added to the difficulties of their march. Still, however, they struggled on, and by 8 P.M. they were within a mile of the slope ascending to the gap, which Shackleton called the Gateway. This gateway was a neck or saddle of drifted snow lying in a gap of the mountain rampart which flanked the last curve of the Glacier, and Scott had hoped to be through it at a much earlier date, as indeed he [Page 353]
would have been had not the prolonged storm delayed him.
By this time the ponies, one and all, were quite exhausted. 'They came on painfully slowly a few hundred yards at a time.... I was hauling ahead, a ridiculously light load, and yet finding the pulling heavy enough. We camped, and the ponies have been shot. Poor beasts!
they have done wonderfully well considering the terrible circ.u.mstances under which they worked.'
On December 8 Wilson wrote in his journal, 'I have kept n.o.bby all my biscuits to-night as he has to try to do a march to-morrow, and then happily he will be shot and all of them, as their food is quite done.' And on the following day he added: 'n.o.bby had all my biscuits last night and this morning, and by the time we camped I was just ravenously hungry.... Thank G.o.d the horses are now all done with and we begin the heavy work ourselves.'
This Camp 31 received the name of Shambles Camp, and although the ponies had not, owing to the storm, reached the distance Scott had expected, yet he, and all who had taken part in that distressing march, were relieved to know that the sufferings of their plucky animals had at last come to an end.
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CHAPTER VIII
ON THE BEARDMORE GLACIER
In thrilling region of thick ribbed ice To be imprison'd in the viewless winds And blown with restless violence round about.
--SHAKESPEARE.
On the death of the ponies at Camp 31 the party was reorganized, and for some days advanced in the following order:
Sledge 1. Scott, Wilson, Oates and P.O. Evans.
Sledge 2. E. Evans, Atkinson, Wright and Lashly.
Sledge 3. Bowers, Cherry-Garrard, Crean and Keohane; with Meares and Demetri continuing to drive the dogs.
When leaving this Camp Scott was very doubtful whether the loads could be pulled over such an appalling surface, and that success attended their efforts was due mainly to the ski. The start was delayed by the readjustments that had to be made, but when they got away at noon, and with a 'one, two, three together' Scott's party began to pull their sledge, they were most agreeably surprised to find it running fairly easily [Page 355]
behind them. The first mile was gained in about half an hour, but then they began to rise, and soon afterwards with the slope becoming steeper and the surface getting worse they had to take off their ski. After this the pulling was extraordinarily exhausting, for they sank above their finnesko, and in some places nearly up to their knees.
The runners of the sledges became coated with a thin film of ice from which it was impossible to free them, and the sledges themselves sank in soft spots to the cross-bars. At 5 P.M. they reached the top of the slope, and after tea started on the down grade. On this they had to pull almost as vigorously as on the upward slope, but they could just manage to get along on ski.
Evans and his party, however, were unable to keep up the pace set by the leaders, and when they camped at 9.15 Scott heard some news that thoroughly alarmed him. 'It appears,' he wrote, 'that Atkinson says that Wright is getting played out, and Lashly is not so fit as he was owing to the heavy pulling since the blizzard. I have not felt satisfied about this party. The finish of the march to-day showed clearly that something was wrong.... True, the surface was awful and growing worse every moment. It is a very serious business if the men are going to crack up. As for myself, I never felt fitter and my party can easily hold its own. P.O. Evans, of course, is a tower of strength, but Oates and Wilson are doing splendidly also.'
Round the spot where Camp 32 had been pitched [Page 356]
the snow was appallingly deep and soft. 'Every step here one sinks to the knees, and the uneven surface is obviously insufficient to support the sledges.' A wind, however, had sprung up, and though under ordinary circ.u.mstances it would have been far from welcome, on this occasion it was a blessing because it hardened the snow; and a good surface was all the more necessary because, after half another march, Meares and Demetri were to return with the dogs, and in consequence 200 lbs. would have to be added to each sledge-load.
Before starting from Camp 32 they built a depot (the Lower Glacier depot), made it very conspicuous, and left a good deal of gear there. Then at the very beginning of their march they got into big pressure, and must have pa.s.sed over several creva.s.ses. After four hours, however, they were clear of the pressure, and then they said good-bye to Meares and Demetri, who took back a note from Scott to say that 'Things are not so rosy as they might be, but we keep our spirits up and say the luck must turn. This is only to tell you that I find I can keep up with the rest as well as of old.'
The start after lunch was anxious work, for the question whether they could pull their loads had to be answered. Scott's party went away first, and, to their joy, found that they could make fairly good headway. Every now and again the sledge sank in a soft patch which brought them up, and then they got sideways to the sledge and hauled it out. 'We learned,' Scott wrote on December 11, at Camp 33, [Page 357]
'to treat such occasions with patience.... The great thing is to keep the sledge moving, and for an hour or more there were dozens of critical moments when it all but stopped, and not a few when it brought up altogether. The latter were very trying and tiring.
But suddenly the surface grew more uniform and we more accustomed to the game, for after a long stop to let the other parties come up, I started at 6 and ran on till 7, pulling easily without a halt at the rate of about 2 miles an hour. I was very jubilant; all difficulties seemed to be vanis.h.i.+ng; but unfortunately our history was not repeated with the other parties. Bowers came up half an hour after us. They also had done well at the last, and I'm pretty sure they will get on all right. Keohane is the only weak spot, and he only, I think, because temporarily blind. But Evans' party didn't get up till 10. They started quite well, but got into difficulties, did just the wrong thing by straining again and again, and so, tiring themselves, went from bad to worse. Their ski shoes, too, are out of trim.'
During the morning of the 12th they steered for the Commonwealth Range until they reached about the middle of the glacier and then the course was altered for the 'Cloudmaker,' and afterwards still further to the west. In consequence they got a much better view of the southern side of the main glacier than Shackleton's party had obtained, and a number of peaks not noticed previously were observed.