dge-fitting,
tents, sleeping-bags, harness, and when one cannot recall a single
expression of dissatisfaction with any one of these items, it shows
what an invaluable assistant he has been....

"BOWERS.--Little Bowers remains a marvel--he is thoroughly enjoying
himself. I leave all the provision arrangements in his hands, and at
all times he knows exactly how we stand ... Nothing comes amiss to
him, and no work is too hard....

"OATES.--Each is invaluable. Oates had his invaluable period with the
ponies: now he is a foot slogger and goes hard the whole time, does
his share of camp work and stands the hardships as well as any of us.
I would not like to be without him either. So our five people are
perhaps as happily selected as it is possible to imagine."

Certainly no living man could have taken Scott's place effectively as
leader of our Expedition--there was none other like him. He was the
Heart, Brain, and Master.

On January 11 just the slightest descent had been made, the height up
being now 10,540 ft., but it will be noticed that they were then getting
temperatures as low as 26 degrees below zero: my party on that date got
10 degrees higher thermometer readings. Surface troubles continued to
waylay them, and their distances, even with five men, were disappointing,
due undoubtedly to this.

On 13th both Bowers and Scott write of a surface like sand, and of
tugging and straining when they ought to be moving easily. On 14th some
members began to feel the cold unmistakably, and on the following day the
whole party were quite done on camping.

The saddest note on the outward march is struck on January 16 when Bowers
sighted a cairn of snow and a black speck, which turned out to be a black
flag tied to a sledge runner, near the remains of a camp--this after such
a hopeful day on the 15th, when a depot of nine days food was made only
27 miles from the Pole--and Scott wrote in his diary:

"... It ought to be a certain thing now, and the only appalling
possibility the sight of the Norwegian Flag forestalling ours...."

Still, there it was, dog tracks, many of them, were picked up and
followed to the Polar Area. Scott, Wilson, Oates, Bowers, and Seaman
Evans reached the South Pole on 17th January, 1912, a horrible day,
temperature 22 degrees below zero. The party fixed the exact spot by
means of one of our little four-inch theodolites, and the result of their
careful observa