s, Atkinson, and a few more of us hoisted the two dead ponies
out of the forecastle, through the skylight, and over the side. It was a
dirty job, because the square of the hatch was so small that a powerful
purchase had to be used which stretched out the ponies like dead rabbits.

We only made good twenty-three miles that day and, although the gale had
abated, it left us a legacy in the shape of a heavy uncomfortable swell.
Most of the bunks were in a sad state, the ship having worked so badly
that the upper deck seams opened everywhere and water had literally
poured into them.

Looking at the fellows' faces in the ward-room at dinner that night there
was no trace of anxiety, worry, or fatigue to be seen. We drank to
sweet-hearts and wives, it being Saturday evening, and those who had no
watch were glad to turn in early.

More fresh wind next day but finer weather to follow. Gran declared he
saw an iceberg on the 5th December, but it turned out to be a whale
spouting. Our runs were nothing to boast of, 150 miles being well above
the average, but the lengthening days told us that we were rapidly
changing our latitude and approaching the ice.

CHAPTER V

ANTARCTICA--THROUGH THE PACK ICE TO LAND

We sighted our first iceberg in latitude 62 degrees on the evening of
Wednesday, December 7. Cheetham's squeaky hail came down from aloft and I
went up to the crow's-nest to look at it, and from this time on we passed
all kinds of icebergs, from the huge tabular variety to the little
weathered water-worn bergs. Some we steamed quite close to and they
seemed for all the world like great masses of sugar floating in the sea.

From latitudes 60 to 63 degrees we saw a fair number of birds: southern
fulmars, whale birds, molly-mawks, sooty albatrosses, and occasionally
Cape-pigeons still. Then the brown-backed petrels began to appear, sure
precursors of the pack ice--it was in sight right enough the day after
the brown-backs were seen. By breakfast time on December 9, when nearly
in latitude 65 degrees, we were steaming through thin streams of broken
pack with floes from six to twelve feet across. A few penguins and seals
were seen, and by 10 a.m. no less than twenty-seven icebergs in sight.
The newcomers to these regions were clustered in little groups on the
forecastle and poop sketching and painting, hanging over the bows and
gleefully watching this lighter stuff being brushed aside by our strong
stem.

We were pas