side of the five bamboo tent poles, so that when the ordinary wind-proof
tent cloth was spread over the poles an air space was provided. There
was, I may say, a sharp difference of opinion as to the value of the
tent; Wilson's party swore by it and Scott was always loud in its praise.
The sailors hated it and despised it; they always argued, when consulted
on the subject of the double tent, that it collected snow and rime and
added much to the weights we had to drag along. Perhaps they were right,
and I remember one occasion when two members of the Expedition dumped the
inner lining after carrying it many hundred miles with the remark,
"Good-bye, you blighter, you've had a damn good ride!"

The scene inside the little green tent baffles description: the three
men's breath and the steam from the cooker settles in no time on the
sides of the tent in a thick, white rime; the least movement shakes this
down in a shower which brings clammy discomfort to all; the dimmest of
light is given by the sledging lantern with its edible candle (for
Messrs. Price and Co. had made our candles eatable and not poisonous),
everything is frozen stiff, fur boots, bags and fur mitts break if
roughly handled, for they are as hard as boards. The cold has carved deep
ruts in the faces of the little company who, despite their sufferings and
discomforts, smile and keep cheerful without apparent effort. This
cheerfulness and the fragrant smell of the cooking pemmican are the two
redeeming features of a dreadful existence, but the discomforts are only
a foretaste of what is to come--one night the temperature fell to 77
degrees below zero, that is 109 degrees of frost. There is practically no
record of such low temperature, although Captain Scott found that Roald
Amundsen in one of his northern journeys encountered something nearly as
bad. One cannot wonder that Wilson's party scarcely slept at all, but
their outward experiences were nothing to what they put up with at Cape
Crozier, which was reached on July 15. To get on to the slopes of Mount