Finally, the Holy of Holies, where Captain Scott and the library occupied
one end and Uncle Bill and myself the far corner, with the ceaselessly
ticking chronometers and many sledging watches. There was an air of
sanctity about this part: all the plotting was done here, charts made and
astronomical observations worked out. Wilson worked up his sketches at
the "plotting table," interviewed the staff here, and above his bunk kept
a third of the shore party's library. We had two comfortable trestle beds
up our end and our leader also had a bed in preference to the
built-up bunk adopted by most of the afterguard. Ours was the Mayfair
district: Wilson and I lived in Park Lane in those days, whilst Captain
Scott occupied Grosvenor Street! He had his own little table covered with
"toney" green linoleum, and also had a multiplicity of little shelves on
which to keep his pipes, tobacco, cigars, and other household gods. It
was well illuminated in this part, and, although, hung around with fur
mitts, fur boots, socks, hats and woollen clothing, there was something
very chaste about this very respectable corner. For the rest of it we had
our Arctic library, and the spare spaces on the matchboard bulkhead,
which fenced it on three sides, were decorated with photographs. In place
of eiderdown Scott's old uniform overcoat usually covered his bed, while
peeping out from under his sleeping place one could espy an emblem of
civilisation and prosperity in the shape of a very good suit-case.

The foregoing pages illustrate sufficiently the grouping of the
afterguard, and if one adds an anthracite stove, a 12 ft. by 4 ft. table,
a pianola, gramophone, and a score of chairs, with a small shelf-like
table squeezed in between the dark-room and Simpson's corner, one
completes the picture of the officers' quarters in the Cape Evans Hut.
A bulkhead of biscuit cases and so on divided us from the men's
accommodation. They were very well off, each seaman having a trestle bed
similar to Captain Scott's, unless he preferred to build a bunk for