bouts, and then we struck southward for a short
distance until we saw just the top of the flagstaff of Corner Camp, which
had been entirely buried up by the winter's snow-drifts. When we reached
the Camp we pitched our tent and dug out all the forenoon, until
eventually we had got all the stores repacked in an accessible fashion at
the top of a great snow cairn constructed by the three of us. It was
about the coldest day's work I ever remember doing.

The job finished, we made ourselves some tea and then started to march
back to Hut Point, nearly thirty-five miles away. We proposed to do this
distance without camping, except for a little food, for we had no wish to
remain another minute at Corner Camp, where it was blowing a strong
breeze with a temperature of 32 degrees below zero all the time we were
digging, in fact about as much as we could stick. When four miles on our
homeward journey the wind dropped to a calm, and at 10.30 we had some
pemmican and tea, having covered nine and a half miles according to our
sledge meter. We started again at midnight, and, steering by stars, kept
our course correct. The hot tea seemed to run through my veins; its
effect was magical, and the ice-bitten feeling of tired men gave way once
more to vigour and alertness.

As we started out again we witnessed a magnificent Auroral display, and
as we dragged the now light sledge onward we watched the gold white
streamers waving and playing in the heavens. The atmosphere, was
extraordinarily clear, and we seemed to be marching in fairyland, but for
the cold which made our breath come in gasps. We were cased lightly in
ice about the shoulders, loins, and feet, and we were also covered with
the unpleasant rime which our backs had brushed off the tent walls when
we had camped. On we went, however, confident but silent. No other sound
now but the swish, swish of our ski as we sped through the soft new snow.
In the light of the Aurora objects stood out with the razor-edge
sharpness of an after-blizzard atmosphere, and the temperature seemed to
fall even lower than at midnight. Our fingers seemed to be cut with the
frost burn, and frost bites played all round our faces, making us wince
with pain.

We were marching, as, it were, under the shadow of Erebus, the great
Antarctic volcano, and on this never-to-be-forgotten night the Southern
Lights played for hours. If for nothing else, it was worth making such a
sledge journey to witness the display