Page:Scott's Last Expedition, Volume 1.djvu/106

48 Tuesday, December 20.—Noon 68° 41′ S., 179° 28′ W. Made good S. 36 W. 58; C. Crozier S. 20 W. 563′. The good conditions held up to midnight last night; we went from lead to lead with only occasional small difficulties. At 9 o'clock we passed along the western edge of a big stream of very heavy bay ice—such ice as would come out late in the season from the inner reaches and bays of Victoria Sound, where the snows drift deeply. For a moment one imagined a return to our bad conditions, but we passed this heavy stuff in an hour and came again to the former condition, making our way in leads between floes of great area.

Bowers reported a floe of 12 square miles in the middle watch. We made very fair progress during the night, and an excellent run in the morning watch. Before eight a moderate breeze sprang up from the west and the ice began to close. We have worked our way a mile or two on since, but with much difficulty, so that we have now decided to bank fires and wait for the ice to open again; meanwhile we shall sound and get a haul with tow nets. I'm afraid we are still a long way from the open water; the floes are large, and where we have stopped they seem to be such as must have been formed early last winter. The signs of pressure have increased again. Bergs were very scarce last night, but there are several around us to-day. One has a number of big humps on top. It is curious to think how these big blocks became perched so high. I imagine the berg must have been calved from a region of hard-pressure ridges. [Later] This is a mistake—on closer inspection it is quite clear that the