lied on ponies he was not
able to start before November: the experience of the Depot Journey showed
that ponies could not stand the weather conditions before that date. But
he could have started earlier if he had taken dogs, in place of ponies,
to the foot of the glacier. This would have gained him a few days in his
race against the autumn conditions when returning.

Such tragedies inevitably raise the question, "Is it worth it?" What is
worth what? Is life worth risking for a feat, or losing for your country?
To face a thing because it was a feat, and only a feat, was not very
attractive to Scott: it had to contain an additional object--knowledge. A
feat had even less attraction for Wilson, and it is a most noteworthy
thing in the diaries which are contained in this book, that he made no
comment when he found that the Norwegians were first at the Pole: it is
as though he felt that it did not really matter, as indeed it probably
did not.

It is most desirable that some one should tackle these and kindred
questions about polar life. There is a wealth of matter in polar
psychology: there are unique factors here, especially the complete
isolation, and four months' darkness every year. Even in Mesopotamia a
long-suffering nation insisted at last that adequate arrangements must be
made to nurse and evacuate the sick and wounded. But at the Poles a man
must make up his mind that he may be rotting of scurvy (as Evans was) or
living for ten months on half-rations of seal and full rations of
ptomaine poisoning (as Campbell and his men were) but no help can reach
him from the outside world for a year, if then. There is no chance of a
'cushy' wound: if you break your leg on the Beardmore you must consider
the most expedient way of committing suicide, both for your own sake and
that of your companions.

Both sexually and socially the polar explorer must make up his mind to be
starved. To what extent can hard work, or what may be called dramatic
imagination, provide a substitute? Compare our thoughts on the march; our
food dreams at night; the primitive way in which the loss of a crumb of
biscuit may give a lasting sense of grievance. Night after night I bought
big buns and chocolate at a stall on the island platform at Hatfield
station, but always woke before I got a mouthful to my lips; some
companions who were not so highly strung were more fortunate, and ate
their phantom meals.

And the darkness, accompanied it may be almos