the previous ration
was not sufficient. The following are some of the data for which I am
indebted to him: the whole subject will be investigated by him and the
results published in a more detailed form.

According to the most modern standards the food requirements for
laborious work at a temperature of zero Fahr. (which is a fair Barrier
average temperature to take) are 7714 calories to produce 10,069
foot-tons of work. The actual Barrier ration which we used would generate
4003 calories, equivalent to 5331 foot-tons of work. Similar requirements
for laborious work at -10 deg. Fahr. (which is a high average plateau
temperature) are 8500 calories to produce 11,094 foot-tons of work. The
actual Summit ration would generate 4889 calories, equivalent to 6608
foot-tons of work. These requirements are calculated for total absorption
of all food-stuffs: but in practice, by visual proof, this does not take
place: this is especially noticeable in the case of fats, a quantity of
which were digested neither by men, ponies, nor dogs.

Several things go to prove that our ration was not enough. In the first
case we were probably not as fit as we seemed after long sledge journeys.
There is no doubt that when sledging men developed an automaticity of
certain muscles at the expense of other muscles: for instance, a sledge
could be hauled all day at the expense of the arms, and we had little
power to lift weights at the end of several months of sledging. In
relation to this I would add that, when the relief ship arrived in
February 1912, four of us were at Cape Evans, but just arrived from three
months of the Polar Journey. The land party, we four among them, were
turned on to sledge stores ashore. This in practice meant twenty miles
every day dragging a sledge; a good deal of 'humping' heavy cases, from
five o'clock in the morning to very late at night; with uncertain meals
and no rests. I can remember now how hard that work was to myself and, I
expect, to those others who had been away sledging. The ship's party
sledged only every other day "because they were not used to it." This was
extremely bad organization, and in view of the possibility that some of
the men might be required for further sledging in the autumn, just silly.

Again, there is the experience of the man-hauling parties of the Polar
Journey. There was, you may remember, a man-hauling party on the way to
the Beardmore Glacier. They travelled with a light sledge but the