THE LEADER'S STORY.

Evening Post, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 72, 26 March 1909, Page 3

THE LEADER'S STORY.

The following supplementary narrative is specially supplied to the Press Association by Lieutenant Shackleton :—: — We started, said Lieutenant Shackleton, from Cape Royds, and on 3rd November from Hut Point. We nad previously laid out at Hut Point, by man-sledging and the motor-car, the main bulk of our equipment, consisting of provisions for ninety-one days. Those provisions were pemmican, biscuits, cheese, chocolate, plasmon, and small bottles of emergency oxol. We had also four sledges, four ponies, two tents, and four one-man sleeping bags. The whole of the tents were made of light Willesden duck, and the whole, including poles, etc., weighed only 301b. The sledges were lift sledges, each sleign weighing 601b, equipped with straps and box as for carrying oil and instruments. The instruments were theodolite, prismatic compasses, cameras, thermometers, and boiling-point thermometers. The food of the four ponies was maize and a ration called Maujes ration, a dried ration consisting of carrots, currants, sugar, plasmon, and meat. We would have started before 3rd November from Hut Point, but that one oi the ponies went lame when crossing the sea ice towards the point. We started, then, from Hut Point on 3rd November, with a supporting party provisioned for fourteen days. They were to go nine days with us, and return in five days, but owing lo xhe soft snow 1 and a four days' blizzard, I sent them back on 7th November. IN A MAZE OF CREVASSES. We were then in a maze of crevasses off White Island, about thirty miles south of Hut« Point. Mr. Ernest Joyce (who, with Mr. Frank Wild, was officer in charge of horses, dogs, and sleighs, and who had been on the Discovery) was in charge of the supporting party. When the supporting partj. left the weather cleared for half v an hour, and we were under weigh, when one of the ponies (which was being led by Adams) suddenly got on to a hidden crack and went down to its middle with him in the soft snow. Wild, who was going astern with the other sledge, saw the danger, and pulled the sledge along, enabling Adams to haul his pony out, just where the crack opened into an apparently bottomless cavern. Another three or four feet and we would have lost Adams, the pony, and half of our provisions. We were going then on an apparently level plain, full of crevasses radiating in all directions, and when the weather cleared we were able to see where these were. We camped there for a day, when the weather cleared. In pitching camp, the ponies have first to be tethered out, ami for that purpose there is a wire made fast on to one sledge, then another sledge is brought up about 25ft away, and the wire is sketched between these two sledges.

i The ponies are tethered by the heels to the wire. The reason for this is, that if we had an ordinary tether they would bite through it and eat the rope. These Manchurian ponies prefer buckles and leather and each others' tails in preference to good ordinary food. Quan, my pony, was particularly keen on these dainties. Having got the ponies tethered, they are brushed down, the horsecloths are put on, and they are then fed. They get 101b of food per day, and if they finish that, and seem to want more, we always give them a bit more. EATING AND SLEEPING. We then pitch our own tents. Each tent has five bamboo poles, three poles being put to windward and two poles for the door, and , are all made fast at the top. 'Lhen the tent is hauled over the top like a. bell tent, only with iive poles. With a shovel we dig snow and put it on the snow cloth around the bottom of the tent ; this keeps the tent from blowing away in a blizzard. The harder it blows the more drift gets round, and the more secure the tent. Then come the meals. The cook for the week would tpread the cloth inside the tent, light a Primus stove, and the cooker (made of aluminium) was passed in to him, then the iood bag, ana generally in half-an-hour the meal was ready. We made what we called "hoosh" ; that was made with pemmican, emergency ration, and powdered biscuit, and each man got a pannikin full. A pannikin would hold about a pint. Then tea was made. We put the tea in with the snow in a strainer, and when it boiled we served it with sugar. Sugar is one of the staple things, because it is heatghing, and all our food is calculated by Dr. Marshall according to its food value and heat-giving pioperties. The ration when we started was 320z of food a day. We all got into one tent for the meal — the cooking tent — and it was the best tent to be in in cold weather. The meal over, the men belonging to the other tent filled the cooker again with snow, and if there was any water over that helped to melt tha snow, and save a certain amount of oil by the time the next cooking was required. ] CLOTHES ON FOR 126 DAYS. | The aleeping-bags w-arc spread and the | men got inbicle them clothes and all. I nevei took ofi my clothes for 126 days. While we had the ponien we mai-ched nine hours a day, from about 8 a.m. to 6 p.m., all6wing one hour for lunch. It was always 8 or 8.30 p.m. before we got into bed, and we got up at twenty minutes to 5 in the morning. It svas daylight, of course, all the while. The weather being to cold, it took us all this time to get dressed. The meal being cooked and the ponies ready for another day's start, we had ' breakfast at 6 a.m., consisting of hoosh, biscuit, and tea, lunch at 1 p.m., consisting of chocolate or cheese, biscuit, and tea, dinner at 7 p.m., consisting of hoosh, biscuit, and cocoa. During this period we weie going over wind-swept snow, with wind furrows on, for about 15 days. HOW PROGRESS WAS MADE. We started in the morning, each man leading a pony, and taking turns every hour to bieak the trail — that is to lead the horse in front. They have the roughest time, and the following horses step in the tiacks of the front hoise. Every hour we had a five minutes' spell. The work was hard both on man and horse, especially after the first 15 days, because the horses sinking rightup to their middles in soft snow. We were not working in ski or snow shoes, but w« woie finnes-koe — that is, fur boots made of the skin of the reindeer with the fur outside. We sank into the snow sbmetimei. well above our ankles, and the horses, of courbe, tank in much deeper, they were dragging so much weight. It was monotonous work travelling. The men would travel about 12 or 15 feet apart for fear of accidents with the sledge or ponies. NEW MOUNTAINS. In answer to further question?, Lieut. Shackleton explained that the journey did not become particularly interesting until they began to sight new land. That was done about 22nd November. Then we saw new mountains stretching away to the pouth beyond Mount Longstaff. Wo were separated from these by a broad expanse of plain. We had different depots. One depot, "A," had been laid out previously, and we reached that on 15th November, some clays before we sighted the mountains. The depot was a mere spot on the great white plain. The next depot was made in lat. 81 degrees 4 minutes south ; that was to pick up on the way back. It was 88 miles from depot "A." USES OF THE PONIES. Then we shot the- first pony, cut him up, and made a depot of oil, biscuit, and pony meat. Then we took on about 501b of pony meat to eke out our provisions. We saw at depot "A" that, to do any big journey, owing to the surface of the snow being so bad, we must reduce our daily; ration of regular food,

and we supplemented half a ration of ordinary food with horse meat. We started using the horse meat about 23rd November. We were using up for the ponies 401b of food per day, and when one was shot the man who had been leading him put on his own harness and helped to pull the extra load given to another pony. The sledge that had been emptied was made into a depot mark, placed end up in the enow with a bam-boo-rod and black flag attached. On 22nd November we had sighted the new mountains, and were still moving due south. On 28th November we shot another pony. Did you shoot them simply for food? acked the ioporter. No, was the answer, not altogether. We were getting short of food for the ponies, and it was, therefore, necessary to decieasc the number of ponies m order that the others might be kept on full rations. We always made a point of keeping the ponies on full rations, so that they never needed the whip. The ponies were doing splendid work, and we treated them as well as possible. The third pony was shot on 30th November. By this time the mountains had trended out to the south-east, and as our course was due south we decided to take advantage of any gap to ascend inland. ASCENDING INLAND. From 22nd to 30th November nothing particular occurred, excepting that we had very thick weather, and the snow was getting softer all the time. Then we made a reconnaisance up the mountain about 3000 ft high, leaving the tent and the laSfc pony in camp. From the top of the mountain we saw an apparently smooth glacier rising with a gentle gradient to what was apparently inland ice or a plateau. We at once decided to go up this glacier. We called the mountain Mount Hope, and the entrance between the two mountains the Southern uateway. The last pony we took with us. We started on sth December to go up the glacier. Our general direction was now between south-west and south-south-west, and at once we saw we were not going to have such an easy time of it, because the apparently smooth glacier was simply honeycombed with crevasses. We managed to get the pony in among the rocks on sth and 6th December. Of course we could not draw the sledges over the rocks, as that would tear the wooden runners. SIX HUNDRED YARDS IN ONE DAY. On the 6th we had to unload the sledges and lelay them with a little equipment one at a time, and on that day we were all day doing 60<^ yards. That was the slowest travelling; up to then we had been doing 12 to 15 statute miles per day. On 7th December one section of the party of three men went on ahead with one sledge. Whilst Wild was leading the pony, Socks (?) followed in our wake with the other sledge. We were looking out for crevasses, and were altering our course to avoid them. The object was to get a perfectly safe course for the pony. Suddenly we heard a shout from Wild, and on stopping and looking round we saw the sledge tilted and Wild with his arms and shoulders on the edge of the crevasse. He was sunk to the shoulders right on the edge of the crevasse, and was keeping himself up by the arms. No pony was to be seen. END OF THE .LAST PONY. We at once went to his assistance, and found that the pony had stepped on the snow lid of a hidden crevasse, and gone straight down an enormous chasm, snapping the swingle-tree, and thus saving both Wild and the sledge. There was no sound to be heard down below, and Wild said all he felt was a sudden rush of wind and then it was all over. MORE TRANSIT TROUBLES. From this time onwards, continued Lieutenant Shackleton, in answer to further questions, we were crossing crevasses the whole time. The under-run-neis of the sledges suffered severely by the sharp ice tearing the wood. Now, a sledge to travel well on a snow surface such as we had eventually on the plateau, ought to be absolutely smooth, because the friction is so great. Ultimately -we had only one whole runner, and that was worn on our last sledge, the runner on the other side having worn away almost from the middle, and the pulling then became very arduous. We reached 6500 ft up the glacier about 19th December, and there we thought we could see the plateau level ahead of us, so we depoted everything except the food to carry us on, the necessary instruments for finding our position, and the clothes we stood up in. We left our warm clothes behind, which, as it turned out, was unfortunate, for the plateau level was not reached until we had ascended to a height of 10,500 feet above sea level. From 9000 feet upwards we had a constant blizzard wind from the south dead in our faces, with the temperature always below zero. Sometimes we had 60 degrees of frost. The clothes _we were scaring consisted of two pairs of socks, pair of Jaager pyjama trousers (we wore these because they did not chafe so much), a singlet, a shirt, and a guernsey, then Burbery overalls. The whole outfit weighed about 91b to 101b. REDUCED THE RATIONS. By this time we had reduced our daily rations of food to 20oz per man per day, and in this climate, with the temperatures and winds prevailing, coupled with the high altitudes, it was not sufficient to keep the necessary amount of heat in our bodies. All this time we were sighting new mountains. Lieutenant Adams was taking, many times daily, meteorological observations*, and it was in lat. 85deg smin south that Wild discovered, on going up a mountain to look at the plateau, seven distinct seams of coal. This was a most interesting discovery, as showing that the Antarctic regions once had a very different climate. Dr. Marshall, who had charge of the surveying, had a very cold job. At every camp he was taking theodolite angles and putting in a great deal of time on this work. He also took all the photographs on this journey. On 4th January we decided to risk leaving a depot on the plateau. We had no land then to take bearing by, and had to trust to Providence to find our depot with the help of guiding poles. These we made by all hands using one tent, and dividing the tent-poles of the second tent for posts. On these poles we put flags made from provision bags. Thus lightened, we pushed rapidly south till, on 7th January, we had reached lat 88deg smirT south. THE LAST FORCED MARCH. The constant blizzard from the south-south-east developed then into one of extreme violence, the wind travelling at 70 miles per hour. The temperature was down to 72deg of frost. This continued for 60 hours, and many times we had to take our feet out of the sleeping-bags to have them restored to feeling after being frost-bitten. We were very j cramped in the one little tent, the four of us being in a tent made to accommodate three. By this time our food was getting very low, and when the blizzard was over we idealised that it would be impossible for us to continue sledging further south, both from lack of food and our diminished strength. Our body temperatures s-howed only 93deg. We, therefore, decided to leave the camp, •and make a forced march to the south, taking food with us, and in 88deg 23min we hoisted the Union Jack, which her Majesty had given us in England before leaving..