Part 19 (1/2)
On the 30th January Lashly and I had been fourteen weeks out, and we had exhausted practically every topic of conversation beyond food, distances made good, temperatures, and the weather. Crean, as already set down, had started with the Main Southern Party a week after Lashly and I had first set out as the pioneers with those wretched failures, the motor sledges.
By this time I had made the unpleasant discovery that I was suffering from scurvy. It came on with a stiffening of the knee joints, then I could not straighten my legs, and finally they were horrible to behold, swollen, bruised, and green. As day followed day my condition became worse: my gums were ulcerated and my teeth loose. Then finally I got haemorrhage. Crean and Lashly were dreadfully concerned on my behalf, and how they nursed me and helped me along no words of mine can properly describe. What men they were. Those awful days--I trudged on with them for hundreds of miles, and each step hurt me more. I had done too much on the outward journey, for what with building all the depot cairns ahead of the pony party, and what with the effects of the spring sledge journey, too much had been asked of me. I had never been out of harness from the day I left Hut Point, for even with the motor sledges we practically pulled them along. Crean had had an easier time, for he had led a pony up to the foot of the Beardmore Glacier, and Lashly had not done the spring sledging journey, which took a certain amount out of me with its temperatures falling to 73 degrees below zero. The disappointment of not being included in the Polar Party had not helped me much, and I must admit that my prospects of winning through became duller day by day. I suffered absolute agonies in forcing my way along, and eventually I could only push myself by means of a ski-stick, for I could not step out properly. I somehow waddled on ski until one day I fainted when striving to start a march. Crean and Lashly picked me up, and Crean thought I was dead. His hot tears fell on my face, and as I came to I gave a weak kind of laugh.
They rigged the camp up once more and put me in my bag, and then those two gallant fellows held a short council of war. I endeavoured to get them to leave me when they came in with their suggestions, but it was useless to argue with them, and I now felt that I had shot my bolt. I vainly tried to persuade them to leave me in my sleeping-bag with what food they could spare, but they put me on the sledge, bag and all, and strapped me as comfortably as they could with their own sleeping-bags spread under me to make for greater ease.
How weary their marches must have been--ten miles of foot slogging each day. I could see them from the sledge by raising my head--how slowly their legs seemed to move--wearily but n.o.bly they fought on until one day a blizzard came and completely spoilt the surface. The two men had been marching nearly 1500 miles, their strength was spent, and great though their hearts were, they had now to give up. In vain they tried to move the sledge with my wasted weight upon it--it was hopeless.
Very seriously and sadly they re-erected our tent and put me once again inside. I thought I was being put into my grave. Outside I heard them talking, low notes of sadness, but with a certain thread of determination running through what they said. They were discussing which should go and which should stay. Crean had done, if anything, the lighter share of the work, as already explained, and he therefore set out to march thirty-five miles with no food but a few biscuits and a little stick of chocolate.
He hoped to find relief at Hut Point. Failing this, he would go on if possible to Cape Evans.
Crean came in to say good-bye to me. I thanked him for what he was doing in a weak, broken sort of way, and Lashly held open the little round tent door to let me see the last of him. He strode out n.o.bly and finely--I wondered if I should ever see him, again. Then Lashly came in to me, shut the tent door, and made me a little porridge out of some oatmeal we got from the last depot we had pa.s.sed.
After I had eaten it he made me comfortable by laying me on Crean's sleeping-bag, which made my own seem softer, for I was very, very sore after being dragged a hundred miles on a jolting, jumping sledge. Then I slept and awoke to find Lashly's kind face looking down at me. There were very few wounded men in the Great War nursed as I was by him.
A couple of days pa.s.sed, and every now and then Lashly would open up the tent door, go out and search the horizon for some possible sign of relief. The end had nearly come, and I was past caring; we had no food, except a few paraffin saturated biscuits, and Lashly in his weakened state without food could never have marched in. He took it all very quietly--a n.o.ble, steel true man--but relief did come at the end of that day when everything looked its blackest.
We heard the baying of the dogs, first once, then again. Lashly, who was lying down by my side quietly talking, sprang to his feet, looked out, and saw!
They galloped right up to the tent door, and the leader, a beautiful gray dog named Krisravitsa, seemed to understand the situation, for he came right into the tent and licked my hands and face. I put my poor weak hands up and gripped his furry ears. Perhaps to hide my feelings I kissed his old hairy, Siberian face with the kiss that was meant for Lashly. We were both dreadfully affected at our rescue.
Atkinson and the Russian dog-boy, Dimitri, had come out hot-foot to save us, and of all men in the Expedition none could have been better chosen than ”Little Aitch,” our clever naval doctor. After resting his dogs and feeding me with carefully prepared foodstuffs, he got me on one sledge and Lashly on the other, the dogs were given their head, and in little more than three hours we covered the thirty-five miles into Hut Point, where I was glad to see Crean's face once more and to hear first hand about his march. It had taken him eighteen hours' plodding through those awful snows from our camp to Hut Point, where fortunately he met Atkinson and Dimitri and told them of my condition.
After the Expedition was over the King gave Lashly and Crean the Albert Medal for their bravery in helping me win through.
It is little enough tribute that I have dedicated this book to these two gallant fellows.
CHAPTER XVI
THE POLE ATTAINED--SCOTT'S LAST MARCHES
The details of Scott's final march to the Pole, and the heartrending account of his homeward journey, of Evans's sad death, of Oates's n.o.ble sacrifice, and of the martyr like end of Wilson, Bowers, and Scott himself have been published throughout the length and breadth of the civilised world. In ”Scott's Last Expedition”--Vol. I. the great explorer's journals are practically reproduced in their entirety. Mr.
Leonard Huxley, who arranged them in 1913, had had to do with Scott's first work, ”The Voyage of the 'Discovery',” and, as Mr. Huxley has said, these two works needed but little editing. Scott's last fine book was written as he went along, and those of us who have survived the Expedition and the Great War, and we are few, are more than proud to count ourselves among the company he chose.
A synopsis of his march from 87 degrees 35 minutes to the South Pole, and a recapitulation of the events which marked the homeward march must certainly find their way into this book, which is after all only the husk of the real story.
However much the story is retold--and it has been retold by members of the Expedition as well as by others--the re-telling will never approach the story as told by Scott himself: for the kernel one must turn to Volume I, of ”Scott's Last Expedition”: However, perhaps I can give something of interest; here is what little Bowers says in extracts from his diary, given me by his mother:
”_January_ 4.--Packed up sledge with four weeks and three days' food for five men, five sleeping-bags, etc. I had my farewell breakfast with Teddy Evans, Crean and Lashly. Teddy was frightfully cut up at not going to the Pole, he had set his heart on it so.
”I am afraid it was a very great disappointment to him, and I felt very sorry about it. Poor Teddy, I am sure it was for his wife's sake he wanted to go. He gave me a little silk flag she had given him to fly on the Pole. After so little sleep the previous night I rather dreaded the march.
”We gave our various notes, messages, and letters to the returning party and started off. They accompanied us for about a mile before turning, to see that all was going on well.
”Our party was on ski with the exception of myself. I first made fast to the central span, but afterwards connected up to the bow of the sledge, pulling in the centre between the inner ends of Captain Scott's and Dr. Wilson's traces.
”This was found to be the best place, as I had to go my own step.
Teddy and party gave us three cheers and Crean was half in tears. They had a featherweight sledge to go back with, of course, and ought to run down their distance easily.