Page:Scott's Last Expedition, Volume 2.djvu/525

of Erebus visible from Cape Evans and Cape Royds with the country beyond the shoulder, which was the last ridge visible from winter quarters.

As we were caught by the fog in the act of camping and the landmarks below had been blotted out all the afternoon by the belt of cloud, we were obliged to wait here until the weather cleared and we could fix the cone, and so persistent was the bad weather that it was not until 10 a.m. of the 7th that we struck Reflection Camp, as we had named it, and were able to proceed.

Our first objective, the Northern Nunatak, or Demetri's Peak as we afterwards named it, was within easy reach by lunch time, so I decided to camp at a large nunatak about a mile and a half from the peak and take a rope party to examine it. So far all the rocks we had passed had been the typical kenyte so familiar to us at Cape Royds, but we found ourselves now camped on basalt, an allied but distinct rock which was not seen by the Professor's party, who had kept close in to the main crater and had not attempted any side issues such as our present divergence. After lunch I took Gran, Abbott, and Dickason, leaving Debenham with Hooper to help him to continue his survey, and made straight for the peak, which we reached without crossing any bad country, though crevasses were numerous above our route.

We climbed the small triangular hill from bottom to top, making its height 300 feet, and from the top we obtained a good view and a photograph of the old crater and of a strongly seracced glacier which loomed up as a bad obstacle in our examination of the district.