horrible winters which God has
invented. They were very hungry, for the wind which kept the sea open
also made the shore almost impossible for seals. There were red-letter
days, however, such as when Browning found and killed a seal, and in its
stomach, "not too far digested to be still eatable," were thirty-six
fish. And what visions of joy for the future. "We never again found a
seal with an eatable meal inside him, but we were always hoping to do so,
and a kill was, therefore, always a gamble. Whenever a seal was sighted
in future, some one said, 'Fish!' and there was always a scramble to
search the beast first."[28]

They ate blubber, cooked with blubber, had blubber lamps. Their clothes
and gear were soaked with blubber, and the soot blackened them, their
sleeping-bags, cookers, walls and roof, choked their throats and inflamed
their eyes. Blubbery clothes are cold, and theirs were soon so torn as to
afford little protection against the wind, and so stiff with blubber that
they would stand up by themselves, in spite of frequent scrapings with
knives and rubbings with penguin skins, and always there were underfoot
the great granite boulders which made walking difficult even in daylight
and calm weather. As Levick said, "the road to hell might be paved with
good intentions, but it seemed probable that hell itself would be paved
something after the style of Inexpressible Island."

But there were consolations; the long-waited-for lump of sugar: the
sing-songs--and about these there hangs a story. When Campbell's Party
and the remains of the Main Party forgathered at Cape Evans in November
1912, Campbell would give out the hymns for Church. The first Sunday we
had 'Praise the Lord, ye heavens adore Him,' and the second, and the
third. We suggested a change, to which Campbell asked, "Why?" We said it
got a bit monotonous. "Oh no," said Campbell, "we always sang it on
Inexpressible Island." It was also about the only one he knew. Apart from
this I do not know whether 'Old King Cole' or the Te Deum was more
popular. For reading they had David Copperfield, the Decameron, the Life
of Stevenson and a New Testament. And they did Swedish drill, and they
gave lectures.

Their worst difficulties were scurvy[29] and ptomaine poisoning, for
which the enforced diet was responsible. From the first they decided to
keep nearly all their unused rations for sledging down the coast in the
following spring, and this meant that they must