t to view on account of the curvature of the foreground.

During most of the day we had travelled over a surface of clear ice,
marked by occasional scars where fissuring, now healed, had at some time
taken place. Beyond the three-mile flag, however, the ice was gashed at
frequent intervals, producing irregular crevasses, usually a few yards
in length and, for the most part, choked with snow. At five and a half
miles we were on the edge of a strip of snow, half a mile across,
whose whiteness was thrown in dazzling contrast against the foil of
transparent, dark ice.

It was dusk, and light drift commenced to scud by, so, as this was a
suitable place to erect a flag, we decided to camp for the night. Some
hours later I woke up to hear a blizzard blowing outside, and to find
Madigan fumbling amongst some gear at the head-end of the tent. From
inside my bag I called out to inquire if there was anything wrong, and
received a reply that he was looking for the primus-pricker. Then he
slipped back into his sleeping-bag, and all became quiet, except for
the snow beating against the tent. So I presumed that he had found it.
Revolving the incident in my mind, and dimly wondering what use he
could have for a primus-pricker in the middle of the night, I again fell
asleep. In the morning the blizzard was still blowing, accompanied by a
good deal of drift. On inquiry I found that Madigan knew nothing of his
midnight escapade. It was a touch of somnambulism.

It would serve no useful purpose to go on in thick drift, for the main
object of our journey was to define the best route through the
crevassed zone; and that could only be done on a clear day. I decided,
accordingly, that if the weather did not improve by noon to leave the
sledge with the gear and walk back to the Hut, intending to make another
attempt when conditions became more settled.

Whilst the others erected a flagstaff and froze the legs of a
drift-proof box (containing a thermograph) into the ice, I made lunch
and prepared for our departure. The tent was taken down and everything
lashed securely on the sledge.

It was nearly 3 P.M. when we set out in thick drift, and in two hours we
were at the Hut; the weather having steadily improved as we descended.
On comparing notes with those at home it appeared that we, at the
fifteen hundred feet level, had experienced much more wind and drift
than they at sea-level.

Webb and his assistants were beginning to make quite a di