ands of miles from their native land, here in this new land
they would find a second home, and those who would equally think of them
in their absence, and welcome them on their return."

But we had to sail round the southern coast of New Zealand and northwards
up the eastern coast before we could arrive at our last port of call. The
wind went ahead, and it was not until the morning of October 28 that we
sailed through Lyttelton Heads. The word had gone forth that we should
sail away on November 27, and there was much to be done in the brief
month that lay ahead.

There followed four weeks of strenuous work into which was sandwiched a
considerable amount of play. The ship was unloaded, when, as usual, men
and officers acted alike as stevedores, and she was docked, that an
examination for the source of the leak might be made by Mr. H. J. Miller
of Lyttelton, who has performed a like service for more than one
Antarctic ship. But the different layers of sheathing protecting a ship
which is destined to fight against ice are so complicated that it is a
very difficult matter to find the origin of a leak. All that can be said
with any certainty is that the point where the water appears inside the
skin of the ship is almost certainly not the locality in which it has
penetrated the outside sheathing. "Our good friend Miller," wrote Scott,
"attacked the leak and traced it to the stern. We found the false stern
split, and in one case a hole bored for a long-stern through-bolt which
was much too large for the bolt.... The ship still leaks but the water
can now be kept under with the hand pump by two daily efforts of a
quarter of an hour to twenty minutes." This in Lyttelton; but in a not
far distant future every pump was choked, and we were baling with three
buckets, literally for our lives.

Bowers' feat of sorting and restowing not only the stores we had but the
cheese, butter, tinned foods, bacon, hams and numerous other products
which are grown in New Zealand, and which any expedition leaving that
country should always buy there in preference to carrying them through
the tropics, was a masterstroke of clear-headedness and organization.
These stores were all relisted before stowing and the green-banded or
Northern Party and red-banded or Main Party stores were not only easily
distinguishable, but also stowed in such a way that they were forthcoming
without difficulty at the right time and in their due order.

The two huts whic