conversation would be an indelicacy, the Heroic Explorer politely leaves
the room, and establishes himself on a chair in a gloomy passage outside,
where he wiles away the time by rehearsing in his imagination how he will
tell off the Chief Custodian when the Person of Importance retires. But
this the Person of Importance shows no sign of doing, and the Explorer's
thoughts and intentions become darker and darker. As the day wears on,
minor officials, passing to and from the Presence, look at him doubtfully
and ask his business. The reply is always the same, "I am waiting for a
receipt for some penguins' eggs." At last it becomes clear from the
Explorer's expression that what he is really waiting for is not to take a
receipt but to commit murder. Presumably this is reported to the destined
victim: at all events the receipt finally comes; and the Explorer goes
his way with it, feeling that he has behaved like a perfect gentleman,
but so very dissatisfied with that vapid consolation that for hours he
continues his imaginary rehearsals of what he would have liked to have
done to that Custodian (mostly with his boots) by way of teaching him
manners.

Some time after this I visited the Natural History Museum with Captain
Scott's sister. After a slight preliminary skirmish in which we convinced
a minor custodian that the specimens brought by the expedition from the
Antarctic did not include the moths we found preying on some of them,
Miss Scott expressed a wish to see the penguins' eggs. Thereupon the
minor custodians flatly denied that any such eggs were in existence or in
their possession. Now Miss Scott was her brother's sister; and she showed
so little disposition to take this lying down that I was glad to get her
away with no worse consequences than a profanely emphasized threat on my
part that if we did not receive ample satisfaction in writing within
twenty-four hours as to the safety of the eggs England would reverberate
with the tale.

The ultimatum was effectual; and due satisfaction was forthcoming in
time; but I was relieved when I learnt later on that they had been
entrusted to Professor Assheton for the necessary microscopic
examination. But he died before he could approach the task; and the eggs
passed into the hands of Professor Cossar Ewart of Edinburgh University.

His report is as follows:

FOOTNOTES:

[150] See pp. xxxix-xlv.

[151] A thermometer which registered -77 deg. at the Winter Quarters