We were now in the Ross Sea, and evidently had avoided the main pack. Our position at noon (Jan. 17) was 70° 43′ South latitude, and 178° 58′ East longitude, and we were steering a little more westerly so as to strike the Barrier well to the east of Barrier Inlet, and also to avoid the heavy pack that previous expeditions had encountered to the east of meridian 160° West. The snow had now become hard and dry, like sago—the true Antarctic type, and numbers of Antarctic petrels circled round and round the ship.

We were now revelling in the indescribable freshness of the Antarctic that seems to permeate one's being, and which must be responsible for that longing to go again which assails each returned explorer from polar regions. On the morning of the 23rd we saw some very large icebergs, which were evidently great masses broken off the Barrier, and we were keeping a sharp look-out for the Barrier itself. The thermometer registered some twelve degrees of frost, but the wind was so dry that we scarcely felt the cold.

At 9.30 A.M. on the 23rd a low straight line appeared ahead of the ship. It was the Barrier. After half an hour it disappeared, but by eleven o'clock the straight line stretching east and west was in full view and we rapidly approached it. I had hoped to make the Barrier about the position of what we call the Western Bight, and at noon we could see a point which was obviously the eastern limit of the Western Bight. Soon afterwards we were within a quarter of a mile of the ice-face, and exclamations of wonder at the stupendous bulk of the Barrier were drawn from those who had not seen it before.

Looking at the Barrier from some little distance, one would imagine it to be a perfectly even wall of ice; when steaming along parallel with it, however, the impression it gave was that of a series of points, each of which looked as though it might be the horn of a bay. Then when the ship came abeam of it, one would see that the wall only receded for a few hundred yards, and afterwards new points came into view as the ship moved on. The weather continued fine and calm, and there was absolutely no sign of the strong westerly current along the Barrier which we had always encountered during the voyage of the Discovery.

About midnight we suddenly came to the end of a very high portion of the Barrier, and entered a wide shallow bay which must have been the inlet where Borchgrevink landed in 1900, but it had changed greatly since that time. About half a mile down this bay we reached fast ice. It was about half-past twelve at night, and the southerly sun shone in our faces.

To the east rose a long snow slope which cut the horizon at the height of about 300 ft. It had every appearance of ice-covered land but we could not stop to make certain, for the heavy ice lying to the northward of us was setting down into the bay, and if we were not to be beset it was necessary to get away at once. All round us were numbers of great whales showing their dorsal fins as they occasionally sounded, so we named this playground for these monsters "The Bay of Whales."

As it was impossible to work to the eastward, we struck northwards through an open lead and came south to the Barrier again about 2 A.M. on the 24th. Then we coasted eastward along the wall of ice, always looking out for the inlet. The lashings had been taken off the motor-car, and the tackle rigged to hoist it out directly we got alongside the ice-foot, to which the Discovery had been moored. For in Barrier Inlet we proposed to place our winter quarters.

I had decided on this inlet because I knew that it was practically the beginning of King Edward VII Land, and that the actual bare land was within an easy sledge journey of that place, and it also had the great advantage of being some ninety miles nearer to the South Pole than any other spot that could be reached with the ship. A further important reason was that it would be an easy matter for the ship on its return to reach this part of the Barrier, whereas King Edward VII Land itself might quite possibly be unattainable if the season was adverse.

However the best-laid schemes often prove impracticable in polar exploration, and within a few hours our first plan was found impossible to fulfil, for the very sufficient reason that the inlet had disappeared. Great disappointment as this was to us, we were thankful that the Barrier had broken away before we had made our camp upon it. The thought of what might have happened made me decide then and there that, under no circumstances, would I winter on the Barrier, and that wherever we landed we would secure a solid rock foundation for our winter home.

We had two strings to our bow and I resolved to use the second and push forward towards King Edward VII Land. The ship was headed eastward, again keeping a few hundred yards off the Barrier, for here the cliff was overhung and a fall of ice would assuredly have been disastrous to us. Soon, however, I saw that we could not make much easting in this way, for by 10 A.M. on the 24th we were close to the pack and found that it was pressed hard against the Barrier edge; and, what was worse, the whole of the northern pack and bergs at this spot were drifting in towards the Barrier.

The seriousness of this situation can be realised by the reader if he imagines that he is in a small boat right under the vertical white cliffs of Dover; that detached cliffs are moving in from seaward slowly but surely with resistless power and force, and that it will only be a question of perhaps an hour or two before the two masses come into contact, and crush his tiny craft as they meet.

There was nothing for it but to retrace our steps, and by steaming hard and working in and out of the looser floes, we just managed to pass the point with barely fifty yards of open water to spare between the Barrier and the pack.

I breathed more freely when we passed this zone of Immediate danger, for there were two or three hundred yards of clear water now between us and the pack, and after skirting along the seaward edge we came to the high cliff of ice at the westerly end, and passed safely out of the bay.

We then continued to the westward until in the evening the ship's head was put north and we gained a fairly open sea. It is, however, remarkable how limited is one's horizon at sea, for although there appeared to be open water for an indefinite distance we were soon up against rigid ice again. The fact is that low pack-ice is not visible at any great distance, and that one cannot trust an appearance of open water. All night long we tried to penetrate to the east, practically doubling in our tracks before we were able to pursue the direction we wished to follow.

By noon on January 25 I found that any hopes I had of a clear run were vain, and the prospect of reaching King Edward VII Land grew remoter every ensuing hour. Indeed it seemed impossible to reach the land, and the shortness of coal, the leaky condition of the ship, and the necessity of landing all our stores and putting up the hut before the vessel left us, made the situation an extremely anxious one. I had not expected to find Barrier Inlet gone, and, at the same time, the way to King Edward VII Land absolutely blocked by ice, though the latter condition was not unusual.

I decided to continue to try and make a way to the east for at least another twenty-four hours, but when we saw the western pack moving rapidly towards us under the influence of the wind, and that it was most probable that we should be inextricably caught for days or even weeks in this great mass, I reluctantly gave orders to turn the ship and make full speed out of this dangerous situation.

Under the circumstances I could see nothing for it except to steer for McMurdo Sound and there make our winter quarters, though I would greatly have preferred to land at King Edward VII Land, because that region was quite unknown and we could have added greatly to the geographical knowledge of it. However the forces of these uncontrollable ice-packs are stronger than human resolution, and a change of plan was forced upon us.

After more trouble with the ice we worked into clearer water and the course was set for McMurdo Sound, where we arrived on January 29 to find that some twenty miles of frozen ice separated us from Hut Point. I decided to lie off the ice-foot for some days in the hope that Nature might break up the ice intervening between us and our goal.

So far the voyage had been without accident to any of the staff, but unfortunately on the 31st Mackintosh was struck in the right eye by a hook, and the eye had to be removed by Marshall, assisted by the other two doctors, Michell and Mackay. Keenly as Mackintosh felt the loss of his eye, his great sorrow was that he would not be able to remain with us in the Antarctic. He begged to stay, but when Marshall explained that he might lose the sight of his other eye he accepted his ill-fortune without demur.

While waiting at the ice I sent a small party—consisting of Adams, Joyce and Wild—to Hut Point to report on the condition of the hut left there by the Discovery expedition in 1904, and on their return Adams reported that the hut was practically clear of snow and the structure intact.

On February 3 I decided to wait no longer, but to seek for winter quarters on the east coast of Ross Island; so we started toward Cape Barne on the look-out for a suitable landing-place. Steaming slowly north along the coast we saw across the bay a long, low snow slope connected with the bare rock of Cape Royds, which seemed a suitable place for winter-quarters.

About eight o'clock I left the ship in a boat, accompanied by Adams and Wild, and we used the hand-lead at frequent intervals until we came to fast ice. This covered the whole of the small bay from the corner of Flagstaff Point (as we afterwards named the seaward cliff at the southern end of Cape Royds) to Cape Barne to the southward. Close up to the Point the ice had broken out, leaving a little natural dock into which we ran the boat, and hundreds of Adelie penguins greeted Adams and me with hoarse squawks of excitement as we landed. I was soon satisfied that Cape Royds would be an excellent place at which to land our stores, and after taking soundings we pulled out towards the ship which had slowly been coming in. We were pulling along at a good rate when suddenly a heavy body shot out of the water, struck the seaman who was pulling stroke, and dropped with a thud to the bottom of the boat. The arrival was an Adelie penguin, which had doubtless thought it was jumping on to a rock, and it would be difficult to say whether the bird or we were the more astonished.

By 10 P.M. on February 3, the Nimrod was moored to the bay ice, and as soon as she was secured I went ashore accompanied by Professor David, England, and Dunlop, to choose a place for building the hut, and up a small valley we soon found an ideal spot for our winter quarters.

The floor of this valley was almost level and covered with a couple of feet of volcanic earth, and there was room not only for the hut itself, but also for the stores and for a stable for the ponies. A hill behind this valley served as an excellent protection from the prevailing strong south-easterly wind, and a number of seals lying on the bay ice gave promise of a plentiful supply of fresh meat.

With this ideal situation and everything else satisfactory, including a supply of water from a lake right in front of our valley, I decided that we had better start to get our gear ashore at once.