e south-west, to the junction between shifting
pack and fast bay-ice, and even there, we afterwards shuddered to find,
it was at least forty-five miles, as the penguin skis, to the land.

It was a fine flat surface on which the sledge ran, and the miles
commenced to fly by, comparatively speaking. Except for an occasional
deep rift, whose bottom plumbed to the sea-water, the going was
excellent. Each day the broken ice on our left receded, the mainland to
the south grew closer and traces of rock became discernible on the low,
fractured cliffs.

On December 17 a huge rocky bluff--Horn Bluff--stood out from the shore.
It had a ram-shaped bow like a Dreadnought battleship and, adjoining it,
there were smaller outcrops of rock on the seaward ice-cliffs. On
its eastern side was a wide bay with a well-defined cape--Cape
Freshfield--at the eastern extremity about thirty miles away.

The Bluff was a place worth exploring. At a distance of more than
fifteen miles, the spot suggested all kinds of possibilities, and in
council we argued that it was useless to go much farther east, as to
touch at the land would mean a detour on the homeward track and time
would have to be allowed for that.

At a point two hundred and seventy miles from the Hut, in latitude 68
degrees 18' S., longitude 150 degrees 12' E., we erected our "farthest
east" camp on December 18, after a day's tramp of eighteen miles. Here,
magnetic "dips" and other observations were made throughout the morning
of the 19th. It was densely overcast, with sago snow falling, but by
3 P.M. of the same day the clouds had magically cleared and the first
stage of the homeward journey had commenced.

CHAPTER XVI HORN BLUFF AND PENGUIN POINT

by C. T. MADIGAN

What thrill of grandeur ours
When first we viewed the column'd fell!
What idle, lilting verse can tell
Of giant fluted towers,
O'er-canopied with immemorial snow
And riven by a glacier's azure flow?

As we neared Horn Bluff, on the first stage of our homeward march, the
upper layers of snow were observed to disappear, and the underlying
ice became thinner; in corrugated sapphire plains with blue reaches of
sparkling water. Cracks bridged with flimsy snow continually let one
through into the water. McLean and I both soaked our feet and once I
was immersed to the thighs, having to stop and put on dry socks and
finnesko. It was a chilly process allowing the trousers to dry on me.