Page:Scott's Last Expedition, Volume 2.djvu/439

The temperature fell a good deal during the night and we could scarcely sleep. Gran, using an eiderdown bag inside his sleeping-bag, was warmer than the other two of us, but later on our journey the eiderdown bag was like a board and he had very little if any advantage from it.

On September 11, at 7 a.m., the temperature was −58·2°, the minimum for the night being −62·3°.

At 9 a.m. we started off, and marched 5½ miles by sledgemeter (statute 6 miles 530 yards).

We built cairns at every night and lunch camp, and small 'top-hats' whenever we had a halt. Corner Camp is very difficult to find, as landmarks are so often obscured by cloud and drift in this vicinity. One of our objects was to mark the track clearly.

We stopped for lunch at 2; the land was entirely obscured by mist, although the sky was clear overhead. Thermometer at −43°.

The surface in the forenoon though variable was fairly good; we marched another 5¾ miles by our sledgemeter during the afternoon and camped at 8.30, the weather gradually becoming worse, wind from W.S.W., with low drift. By the time our tent was pitched a fair blizzard was on us. Temperature −34·5°.

By 10 p.m. the tent was well drifted up, weather squally, but all snug inside. We had with us the new pattern double tent, which is a horrible thing—it shortens the space down so, and is the most trying thing to spread in a breeze. To quote my diary: 'There is a sharp difference of opinion as to the value