e snow outside. To
increase its size, tunnels were afterwards driven into the bank of snow
and timber was stowed in these so as to be safe from burial and loss.

The building was finished just in the nick of time. Snow came down so
thickly that had the falls occurred a few days earlier, the cases from
which the place was constructed would have been effectually buried and
the construction made an impossibility.

But for the wind, the Hut would have been lost to sight. Still, it was
completely surrounded by massive drifts, and the snow was driven by the
wind past the canvas flap and through the entrance, until the veranda
became choked.

Close, who was night-watchman during the early morning hours of April 7,
had the greatest difficulty in getting outside to attend to his duties.
To dig his way through the entrance, reach the instruments and to return
occupied a whole hour.

We were inundated with snow; even a portion of the roof was buried.
The situation required immediate attention; so it was decided to make a
tunnel connecting the entrance veranda with the store veranda. From the
north-western end of the latter, an out-draught had established itself,
preserving a vertical funnel-like opening in the snow bank, always free
for entrance or exit. This proved a fortunate accident.

Further, a second tunnel, over twenty feet in length, was driven out
from the original entrance with a view to reaching the surface at a
point beyond the lee of the Hut. It was thought that the scouring effect
of the wind, there, would keep the opening of the tunnel free of drift.
But when completed, it filled rapidly with snow and had to be sealed. It
was then used to receive slop-water. While the fever for excavation
was at its height, Whetter drove, as an off-shoot to the first, another
tunnel which came to be used as a nursery for the pups.

At this stage, to leave the Hut, it was necessary to crawl through a low
trap-door in the wall of the inside or entrance veranda; the way then
led to the connecting tunnel and onwards to the store veranda; finally
one climbed through a manhole in the snow into the elements without.
From the store veranda there was access to the Hangar by a hinged door
in the common wall, and, as an additional convenience, a trap-door was
made in the roof of the inner veranda to be used during spells of clear
weather or in light drift.

The old landmarks became smothered in snow, making the Hut's position a
matter