m., when we laid the ship alongside a floe in loose pack. Heavy snow
was falling, and I was anxious lest the westerly wind should bring the
pack hard against the coast and jam the ship. The 'Nimrod' had a
narrow escape from a misadventure of this kind in the Ross Sea early in
1908.
We made a start again at 5 a.m. the next morning (January 12) in
overcast weather with mist and snow-showers, and four hours later broke
through loose pack-ice into open water. The view was obscured, but we
proceeded to the south-east and had gained 24 miles by noon, when three
soundings in lat. 74° 4? S., long. 22° 48? W. gave 95, 128, and 103
fathoms, with a bottom of sand, pebbles, and mud. Clark got a good
haul of biological specimens in the dredge. The 'Endurance' was now
close to what appeared to be the barrier, with a heavy pack-ice foot
containing numerous bergs frozen in and possibly aground. The solid ice
turned away towards the north-west, and we followed the edge for 48
miles N. 60° W. to clear it.
Now we were beyond the point reached by the 'Scotia', and the land
underlying the ice-sheet we were skirting was new. The northerly trend
was unexpected, and I began to suspect that we were really rounding a
huge ice-tongue attached to the true barrier-edge and extending
northward. Events confirmed this suspicion.
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