Page:Scott's Last Expedition, Volume 2.djvu/234

ice has held. Otherwise it will mean that we shall have to go over the plateau, climbing up by Mount Larsen, and coming down the Ferrar Glacier, and if so we cannot start until November, and the food will be a problem.

We made a terrible discovery in the hoosh to-night: a penguin's flipper. Abbott and I prepared the hoosh. I can remember using a flipper to clean the pot with, and in the dark Abbott cannot have seen it when he filled the pot. However, I assured everyone it was a fairly clean flipper, and certainly the hoosh was a good one.

July 5.—A heavy snowstorm from the S.E., the first one we have had from that quarter since the hut was ready. It blocked the entrance completely. Consequently the air got pretty bad. The primus went out and the lamps burnt dimly until we dug through the drift and let in fresh air. Priestley and I cleared the door, but it was so thick with snow it soon drifted up again. It felt wonderfully warm out and we got quite hot digging. During the night we kept night watch two hours each, the watchman's duty being to keep the entrance from being blocked, as it was useless trying to keep the chimney clear—in fact, snow came down so fast it put the blubber fire out, and the smoke rendered the hut almost untenable, so that we had to cook the evening hoosh with the primus and use most of our precious oil.

July 7—Blew hard all night, drifting up the outer door completely. We cleared the shaft, but as our chimney was buried in drift, we could get no draught for the blubber fire, so we had to build the chimney up with seal skin and snow blocks. All this time the drift