The milk-powder and sugar are necessarily boiled
with the tea or cocoa.
"We are, of course, very short of the farinaceous element in our diet,
and consequently have a mild craving for more of it. Bread is out of
the question, and as we are husbanding the remaining cases of our
biscuits for our prospective boat journey, we are eking out the supply
of flour by making bannocks, of which we have from three to four each
day. These bannocks are made from flour, fat, water, salt, and a
little baking-powder, the dough being rolled out into flat rounds and
baked in about ten minutes on a hot sheet of iron over the fire. Each
bannock weighs about one and a half to two ounces, and we are indeed
lucky to be able to produce them."
A few boxes of army biscuits soaked with sea-water were distributed at
one meal. They were in such a state that they would not have been
looked at a second time under ordinary circumstances, but to us on a
floating lump of ice, over three hundred miles from land, and that
quite hypothetical, and with the unplumbed sea beneath us, they were
luxuries indeed. Wild's tent made a pudding of theirs with some
dripping.
Although keeping in mind the necessity for strict economy with our
scanty store of food, I knew how important it was to keep the men
cheerful, and that the depression occasioned by our surroundings and
our precarious position could to some extent be alleviated by
increasing the rations, at least until we were more accustomed to our
new mode of life.
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