but he . . . does not pull as much as a younger man . . . when he led we could see he pulled comparatively little; since then it is difficult to judge but seeing he travels with thumbs tucked in his braces . . . one concludes he lays his weight on harness rather than pulling. Several times when we have been struggling heavily with hauling he has continued to recite poetry or tell yarns.
Mawson's complaints were not idle banter. For much of late November their distances decreased, and the two younger men believed this was attributable to David's inadequacies. But their progress was to become slower yet. On 26 November, while Mackay slaughtered a seal, David and Mawson climbed a rocky headland 600 feet high. From there they could see, ten to fifteen miles ahead, the vast Drygalski Ice Barrier. 'We were not a little concerned to observe with our field-glasses that the surface of the Drygalski Glacier was wholly different to that of the Nordenskjold Ice Barrier,' David wrote, adding:
The surface of the Drygalski Glacier was formed of jagged surfaces of ice very heavily crevassed, and projecting in the form of immense seracs separated from one another by deep undulations or chasms. It at once suggested to my mind some scaly dragon-like monster and recalled the lines of Milton . . . The 'Scaly horror of his folded tail' did not seem enchanting even at this distance . . . We could see much of this glacier was absolutely impossible for sledging.
Presumed impossible or not, the Drygalski Ice Tongue extends more than thirty miles into the Ross Sea, meaning it would have to be trekked across rather than around. On 1 December they started over what David described as 'high sastrugi, hummocky ice ridges, steep undulations of bare blue ice with frequent chasms impassable for a sledge, unless it was unloaded and lowered by alpine rope.' Three hours' hard labour gained only half a mile, and that afternoon they retreated to the sea ice to find another way. After two days travelling east they spied 'a broad-bottomed snow valley'. It was not so inviting as it appeared, however, and it took them a week of cruel hauling and constant danger to pass through an area that eventually looked 'as though a stormy sea had suddenly been frozen solid'.
On 9 December Mackay finally spied the sea north of the ice tongue.
'He announced his discovery with shouts of θáλaττa, θáλaττa, which thrilled us now as of old they thrilled the Ten Thousand,' wrote David, lapsing into his classical education to quote Xenophon's more than two-millennium-old rendering of 'The sea! The sea!' But although the coast was only four miles away, it took them another two days to reach it. Shortly before they did, Mackay went ahead to reconnoitre. Taking advantage of the break, Mawson disappeared into the tent to change the photographic plates, and David started to go make sketches. T had scarcely gone more than six yards from the tent, when the lid of a crevasse suddenly collapsed under me,' David later wrote. T only saved myself from going right down by throwing my arms out and staying myself on the snow lid on either side.'
Mawson was the Prof's only chance. But he did not immediately go to his mentor's aid, as he later explained to The Sydney Morning Herald:
I was busy changing photographic plates in the only place where it could be done - inside the sleeping bag . . . Soon after I had done up the bag, having got safely inside, I heard a voice from outside - a gentle voice calling: 'Mawson, Mawson.'
'Hallo!' said I.
'Oh, you're in the bag changing plates, are you?' said the Professor.
'Yes, Professor.'
There was silence for some time. Then I heard the Professor calling in a louder tone: 'Mawson!'
'I answered again. Well, the Professor heard by the sound I was still in the bag. So he said: - 'Oh, still changing plates are you?'
'Yes.'
More silence for some time. After a minute, in a rather loud and anxious tone: 'Mawson!'
I thought there was something up, but could not tell what he was after. I was getting rather tired, and called out: 'Hallo. What is it? What can I do?'
'Well, Mawson, I am in a rather dangerous position. I am really hanging on by my fingers to the edge of a crevasse, and I don't think I can hold on much longer. I shall have to trouble you to come and assist me.'
I came our rather quicker than I can say. There was the Professor, just his head showing, and hanging on to the edge of a dangerous crevasse.
Mawson soon had David out of the crevasse, and the older man calmly began his sketching.
The next day David took another disaster just as stoically. When it became obvious that there was no 'low, sloping shore', he dispassionately suggested that they build a depot at a giant ice mound. It was far from the coast, but was 'a conspicuous object to any one approaching . . . by sea from the north'. Here they left the Christmas Tree sledge, geological specimens, spare clothing and a letter outlining their plans. Those, in a nutshell, were to gain the Plateau via a large glacier that ran between two high, imposing peaks to the northwest, Mount Nansen and Mount Larsen, and thence to continue to the Magnetic Pole. Little did they know it, but even as they cooked seal meat in preparation for their ascent, Shackleton and his companions were slowly making their own way up an even larger glacier.
What a delight it must have been when they finally left the depot on 16 December, after two days kept in their tent by a blizzard. They were pulling approximately 670 pounds, but so comparatively rested were they that it moved almost with ease. More importantly, for the first time in more than two months they were not relaying, and for the first couple of days their mileage took an impressive jump.
The going did not remain easy, however. Heading for what later was named the Reeves Glacier, they encountered an exceedingly treacherous area, and on their third day they were brought up short by a barranca a shallow, icy, heavily crevassed ravine, more than 120 yards wide. They camped until that night, when the temperatures were at their lowest, and then raced over it on an unstable ice bridge. Later that day, however, another snow bridge did not prove so strong. While crossing, Mawson fell clear through and was only stopped when the rope connecting him to the sledge pulled him up eight feet below the surface. Mackay and David hastily hauled him out, but not before he 'secured some ice crystals from the side of the crevasse, and threw them up for examination'.
By 20 December they found themselves in a labyrinth of pressure ridges and crevasses and realised they could not safely continue. Rather than retreating over their earlier tracks, they slowly made their way southwest on a small branch glacier. In the next several days they turned northwest, to a feature they named the Larsen Glacier, since it flowed past Mount Larsen. Here, at 2,000 feet above sea level, they spent a Christmas more or less unmarked except by a present from David and Mawson to Mackay. The Scot had long since run out of tobacco, and to substitute for its use in his pipe they presented him with a small supply of sennegrass, the valuable insulator for finnesko.
On 27 December, at a height of 2,800 feet, having reached a hard snow that made them think they were leaving the glacier ice, they depoted their ice axes, ropes, ski boots, geological specimens and a bit of food. As they moved on, Mackay, who had been observing the clouds, wrote that 'one large one straight in front of us seemed as it if were leading us to the promised land'.
Straight ahead it was indeed, and straightforward as well. For the next week the trio moved quickly across hard neve with no need to dodge and weave around natural barriers. The better surface allowed them to gain more than ten miles each day despite a continual ascent that brought them to 6,500 feet above sea level. However, a decision taken at the depot to hold back one-eighth of their food as an emergency ration meant correspondingly smaller meals, and this quickly affected them. 'The scarcity of food had been telling on us - we are now really weak,' Mawson wrote. 'The Professor seems most affected by the altitude, and is quite prostrated between hauls - so done does he seem that can scarcely give a hand in setting up tent and packing sledge. Also his memory seems fainter. He is certainly however doing his best.'
After a week of reduced rations - broken only by New Year's Day dinner - they realised t
hat their pulling power was waning, so they returned to regular portions. Even this did not stop the thoughts of foods that had begun constantly to enter their minds. 'We are now almost mad on discussing foods,' Mawson wrote, 'all varieties having a great attraction for us. We dote on what sprees we shall have on return - mostly run to sweet foods and farinaceous compounds.' On 12 January, during their halts, they planned two dinners to be arranged by David in Sydney, one a Scots meal for Mackay, the other the 'Yorkshire Empire Dinner'. That night, each carefully listed the entire meals, the nine-course Scots dinner including such items as 'Grouse baked on toast with toasted crumbs and bread sauce, chipped potatoes' and 'Sheep's head and trotters garnished with carrots, turnips, kale, onions, potatoes.' After his wine list, Mackay noted that 'It is wonderful what a lot we think and talk about our bellies. I could almost eat my Finnskoe.'
In the week prior to this, they had continued their impressive progress, hauling ten to eleven miles each day despite slowly continuing their ascent even when they had unmistakably passed on to the Plateau. But on 13 January their excitement was dashed when Mawson's measurements showed the Magnetic Pole to be farther still - they would need another four days to reach it. Mackay became depressed about the extra time, which he thought would prevent them from returning safely, but never the less the threesome moved ahead over an area never before seen by man.
'The surface of the snow over which we were sledging was sparkling with large reconstructed ice crystals, about half an inch in width and one-sixteenth of an inch in thickness,' David wrote,
crystals form on this plateau during warm days . . . We observe that after every still sunny day a crop of these crystals develops on the surface of the neve, and remains there until the next wind blows them off. In the bright sunlight the neve, covered with these sheets of bright reflecting ice crystals, glittered like a sea of diamonds. The heavy runners of our sledge rustled gently as they crushed the crystals by the thousand. It seemed a sacrilege.
At noon on 15 January, Mawson again took magnetic observations, which showed them to be near their goal, although precise measurement was difficult because 'the polar centre executes a daily round of wanderings about its mean position'. He determined that if they waited where they were for twenty-four hours, the Pole would likely come to them, but rather than do this, they decided to push on thirteen miles the next day to where he calculated the mean position to lie.
On the morning of 16 January, after travelling two miles, they depoted all their non-essential kit and continued six miles to where they lunched. Like Shackleton and his companions a week earlier, they left their gear other than a camera and flag and walked the final five miles to Mawson's 'mean position'. There, at 72°i5'S, i55°i6'E, and a height of 7,260 feet, David and Mackay hoisted the Union Jack while Mawson set up the camera so that it could be triggered by a string.
The men bared their heads, and as David pulled the string he declared, 'I hereby take possession of this area now containing the Magnetic Pole for the British Empire.' They gave three cheers for the King, but, despite having fulfilled Ross' wish that the British flag be planted at the South Magnetic Pole, 'we were too utterly weary to be capable of any great amount of exultation.'
They had achieved their goal, but now they had one even more important - to return alive. As with Shackleton, Wild, Marshall and Adams, who had been 1,112 miles farther south, there was no reason to linger. 'With a fervent "Thank God" we all did a right-about turn,' wrote David, 'and as quick a march as tired limbs would allow back in the direction of our little green tent in the wilderness of snow.'
The three were now racing against time. The next morning they calculated their position to be approximately 250 miles from their depot, and they had only fifteen days to reach it to meet Nimrod. They had to average better than sixteen miles a day, a vast total compared to what they had previously done, although they would be helped by having a lighter sledge and travelling downhill. Things were still not easy. Day after day it was about — 200 in the morning, and sometimes did not rise above — 6° even in the heat of the day. Moreover, Mawson soon injured his leg and could not pull at full strength, while the Professor was showing his age.
Never the less, they forced themselves to cover the required sixteen miles, and each day they did so, even if it meant pulling longer hours than their bodies could easily manage. As always, the more tired they were, the more argumentative, and soon tempers flared over the most trivial of matters. One morning, just for a change, Mawson put a lump of sugar in the hoosh. David's response was to describe him as 'a bold culinary experimenter', but Mackay's was more robust. Detecting an unusual flavour, he launched into a severe interrogation of the mess-man, who admitted to the sugar. Mackay became indignant and offensive, ultimately blaring out that Mawson was selfish and this 'awful state of affairs' had developed as the result of having to sledge with 'two foreigners'.
Shortly thereafter their epicurean woes continued, as a miscalculation meant they were short of tea for a week. However, like Shackleton's party, they were following their sledge tracks, so they stopped at successive outward camps and retrieved the used tea leaves, which they boiled again.
For eight of the next nine days they made their required mileage, only once stopping a mile short of the goal. Late in the month, the mountains, which they had lost sight of on their way out, hove up, each in turn giving additional encouragement. On 26 January, they reached an area of marble-like neve, broken into successive steep slopes, and, slipping and tumbling without crampons, they gained only fourteen and a half miles, although they did make a significant descent, dropping to an area that was considerably warmer.
Two days later, on David's fifty-first birthday, they made up for any shortfalls. They woke to a twenty-five-mile-per-hour wind, so they hoisted their floorcloth as a sail and raced twenty miles. 'Occasionally, in an extra strong puff of wind, the sledge took charge,' David wrote. 'On one of these occasions it suddenly charged into me from behind, knocked my legs from under me, and nearly juggernauted me. I was quickly rescued from this undignified position under the sledge runners.' That afternoon, 'with a faint hope of softening the stern heart of our messman for the week', David reminded Mackay that it was his birthday. The Scotsman took the hint and increased their food ration that evening.
The next day another twenty-mile performance took them to their depot and their much-missed ski boots, ice axes and ropes. But on 30 January they made a critical error. Mackay advocated retracing their steps of a month earlier, but Mawson and David overruled him, deciding to go straight down the Larsen Glacier to where it reached the Drygalski Ice Barrier. It proved to be one of the most difficult sections of ice they ever crossed, at points dropping forty-five degrees, and each of them went into crevasses. Mawson's leg gave him excruciating pain throughout the descent, leading him to complain: 'hardly ever had a worse time in my life. Agony all day.'
Near the bottom of the glacier was a chaotic nightmare of hidden 'hell holes' and serac ice. Here they tried a route that would take them away from the Drygalski and to the smooth sea ice, from where they could head for their depot. But on 31 January, despite taking only half a sledge-load, they met nothing but despair, disappointment and agonisingly slow progress. One after another, they fell into crevasses, and at one point they were confronted by such an enormous pressure ridge that they had to unload the sledge and manhandle each individual item over it. They could not find a place to camp until 7.00 the next morning. They were, according to their figures, sixteen miles from the depot, but they only had short rations for two days. More importantly, the ship might even then be passing and sailing away.
When the three men awoke on the afternoon of 1 February, a heavy snow was coming down. They tried to travel in it, but could only struggle a mile and a half, so they turned in again without eating. They had now been man-hauling for almost four months, and the physical beating they had taken is almost unimaginable. But on the Larsen Glacier and in the following days, it was their me
ntal stamina, not their physical endurance, that finally snapped.
For some time Mawson had noted that the Professor had been troubled. 'Something has gone very wrong with him of late as he almost morose,' he wrote, 'never refers to our work, shirks all questions regarding it, never offers a suggestion.' The terrible conditions had almost broken the older man. They proved even worse for Mackay. Both had started to come apart at the seams, as Mawson recorded:
Prof's burberry pants are now so much torn as to be falling off. He is apparently half demented [judging] by his actions - the strain has been too great. He says himself that had we known the magnitude he would not have undertaken it. . . Mac, it seems, got on to the Prof properly at one halt during afternoon whilst I was reconnoitring. He told the Prof also that he would have to give me written authority as commander or he would, as medical man, pronounce him insane.
On the morning of 2 February the sun was shining, but Mackay's humanity was not as much in evidence. The three set off in desperate hope of reaching their depot, and after four miles they left behind their scientific equipment and all but their essentials. With the lighter load, they moved more quickly, but evidently not fast enough for Mackay, who several times during the day viciously kicked David in the ankles, as if to encourage him to pull harder. That evening, during a stop for a snack, Mawson spied the depot flag, and they changed course. At midnight, when the temperature had fallen to zero, David asked for a halt. His boots were frozen on, and when Mawson pulled them off, he found the Professor's feet were frostbitten. While Mawson helped restore their circulation, Mackay disinterestedly pronounced them more or less gangrenous. 'During most of the day the Prof has been walking on his ankles,' Mawson recorded, noting that when Mackay kicked him, 'He was no doubt doing his best.'
Shackleton’s Forgotten Expedition Page 30
