uth of One Ton._ We have found them--to
say it has been a ghastly day cannot express it--it is too bad for words.
The tent was there, about half-a-mile to the west of our course, and
close to a drifted-up cairn of last year. It was covered with snow and
looked just like a cairn, only an extra gathering of snow showing where
the ventilator was, and so we found the door.

It was drifted up some 2-3 feet to windward. Just by the side two pairs
of ski sticks, or the topmost half of them, appeared over the snow, and a
bamboo which proved to be the mast of the sledge.

Their story I am not going to try and put down. They got to this point on
March 21, and on the 29th all was over.

Nor will I try and put down what there was in that tent. Scott lay in the
centre, Bill on his left, with his head towards the door, and Birdie on
his right, lying with his feet towards the door.

Bill especially had died very quietly with his hands folded over his
chest. Birdie also quietly.

Oates' death was a very fine one. We go on to-morrow to try and find his
body. He was glad that his regiment would be proud of him.

They reached the Pole a month after Amundsen.

We have everything--records, diaries, etc. They have among other things
several rolls of photographs, a meteorological log kept up to March 13,
and, considering all things, a great many geological specimens. _And they
have stuck to everything._ It is magnificent that men in such case should
go on pulling everything that they have died to gain. I think they
realized their coming end a long time before. By Scott's head was
tobacco: there is also a bag of tea.

Atkinson gathered every one together and read to them the account of
Oates' death given in Scott's Diary: Scott expressly states that he
wished it known. His (Scott's) last words are:

"For God's sake take care of our people."

Then Atkinson read the lesson from the Burial Service from Corinthians.
Perhaps it has never been read in a more magnificent cathedral and under
more impressive circumstances--for it is a grave which kings must envy.
Then some prayers from the Burial Service: and there with the floor-cloth
under them and the tent above we buried them in their sleeping-bags--and
surely their work has not been in vain.[291]

That scene can never leave my memory. We with the dogs had seen Wright
turn away from the course by himself and the mule party swerve
right-handed ahead of us. He had seen what he thought was