e immediately put over
the Agassiz trawl. After dragging it along the bottom for half an hour we
hauled in and found the net full of stuff. Big-mouthed fish, worms,
spiders, anemones, sea-cucumbers, polyzoa, prawns, little fish like
sardines, one spiky fish like nothing on earth, starfish and octopus,
limpets with jointed shells, sponges, ascidians; isopods, and all kinds
of sea lice. Enough to keep Lillie busy for weeks.

The evening before we finally broke through into open water was
beautifully still, and a low cloud settled down in the form of a thick
fog--it was a change from the fine, clear weather--frost rime settled
everywhere, and for a time we had to stop. There was a weird stillness
over all, and whenever the ship was moved amongst the ice-floes a curious
hiss was heard; this sound is well known to all ice navigators: it is the
sear of the floe against the greenheart sheathing which protects the
little ship, and it is to the ice-master what the strange smell of the
China Seas is to the far Eastern navigator, what the Mediterranean
"cheesy odours" and the Eucalyptus scents of Australia are to the P. and
O. officers, and what the pungent peat smoke of Ireland is to the North
Atlantic seaman. I suppose the memory of the pack ice hissing around a
wooden ship is one of the little voices that call--and they sometimes
call as the memory of "a tall ship and a star to steer her by" calls John
Masefield's seamen "down to the sea again." I sometimes feel a mute fool
at race meetings, society dinner parties, and dances, the lure of the
little voices I know then at its strongest. It is felt by the Polar
explorer in peace times and in the hey-day of prosperity, and it is
surely that which called Scott away, when he had everything that man
wants, and made him write as he lay nobly dying out there in the snowy
wild:

"How much better has it been than lounging in too great comfort at home."

But this is yielding dream to my narrative, and I must apologise and
continue with the closing chapter.

After this fog, which held us up awhile, we got into one more lot of pack
varying in thickness and containing some fine long water lanes, and then
we made for Cape Bird, which we rounded on January 18, to find open water
right up to Cape Evans.

A tremendous feast was prepared, the table in the wardroom decked with
little flags and silk ribbons. Letters were done up in neat packets for
each member, and even champagne was got up fr