up steam and his men struggling
to replace the anchors.

"We got out the men and gave some help. At 6 steam was up, and I was
right glad to see the ship back out to windward, leaving us to recover
anchors and hawsers."[114]

A big berg drove in just after the ship had got away, and grounded where
she had been lying. The ship returned in the afternoon, and it seems that
she was searching round for an anchorage, and trying to look behind this
berg. There was a strongish northerly wind blowing. The currents and
soundings round Cape Evans were then unknown. The current was setting
strongly from the north through the strip of sea which divides
Inaccessible Island from Cape Evans, a distance of some two-thirds of a
mile. The engines were going astern, but the current and wind were too
much for her, and the ship ran aground, being fast for some considerable
distance aft--some said as far as the mainmast.

"Visions of the ship failing to return to New Zealand and of sixty people
waiting here arose in my mind with sickening pertinacity, and the only
consolation I could draw from such imaginations was the determination
that the southern work should go on as before--meanwhile the least ill
possible seemed to be an extensive lightening of the ship with boats as
the tide was evidently high when she struck--a terribly depressing
prospect.

"Some three or four of us watched it gloomily from the shore whilst all
was bustle on board, the men shifting cargo aft. Pennell tells me they
shifted 10 tons in a very short time.

"The first ray of hope came when by careful watching one could see that
the ship was turning very slowly, then one saw the men running from side
to side and knew that an attempt was being made to roll her off. The
rolling produced a more rapid turning movement at first, and then she
seemed to hang again. But only for a short time; the engines had been
going astern all the time and presently a slight movement became
apparent. But we only knew she was getting clear when we heard cheers on
board, and more cheers from the whaler.

"Then she gathered stern way and was clear. The relief was
enormous."[115]

All this took some time, and Scott himself came back into the hut with us
and went on bagging provisions for the Depot journey. At such times of
real disaster he was a very philosophical man. We were not yet ready to
go sledging, but on January 23 the ice in North Bay all went out, and
that in South Bay began to