The Worst Journey in the World (73 page)

The dog-biscuits, provided by Spratt, weighed 8 oz. each, and their
sledging ration was 1½ lbs. a day, given to them after they reached the
night camp. We made seal pemmican for them and tried this when sledging,
as an occasional variation on biscuit, but they did not thrive on this
diet. The oil in the biscuits caused purgation, as also did the pemmican:
the fat was partly undigested and the excreta were eaten. The ponies also
ate their excreta at times. Certain dogs were confirmed leather eaters,
and we carried chains for them: on camping, these dogs were taken out of
their canvas and raw-hide harnesses, and attached to the sledge by the
chains, care being taken that they could not get at the food on the
sledge. When sledging, Amundsen gave his dogs pemmican but I do not know
what else: he also fed dog to dog: I do not know whether we could have
fed dog to dog, for ours were Siberian dogs which, I am told, will not
eat one another. At Amundsen's winter quarters he gave them seal's flesh
and blubber one day, and dried fish the next.
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On the long voyage
south in the Fram, he fed his dogs on dried fish, and three times a week
gave them a porridge of dried fish, tallow, and maize meal boiled
together.
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At Cape Evans or at Hut Point our dogs were given plenty
of biscuit some evenings, and plenty of fresh frozen seal at other times.

Our worst trouble with the dogs came from far away—probably from Asia.
There are references in Scott's diary to four dogs as attacked by a
mysterious disease during our first year in the South: one of these dogs
died within two minutes. We lost many more dogs the last year, and
Atkinson has given me the following memorandum upon the parasite, a
nematode worm, which was discovered later to be the cause of the trouble:

"
Filaria immitis.
—A certain proportion of the dogs became infected
with this nematode, and it was the cause of their death, mainly in the
second year. It was present at the time the expedition started (1910) all
down the Pacific side of Asia and Papua, and there was an examination
microscopically of all dogs imported at this time into New Zealand. The
secondary host is the mosquito Culex.

"The symptoms varied. The onset was usually with intense pain, during
which the animal yelled and groaned: this was cardiac in origin and
referable to the presence of the mature form in the beast. There was
marked haematuria, and the animals were anaemic from actual loss of
haemoglobins. In nearly all cases there was paralysis affecting the
hindquarters during the later stages, which tended to spread upwards and
finally ended in death.

"The probable place of infection was Vladivostok before the dogs were put
on board ship and deported to New Zealand. The only method of coping with
the disease is prevention of infection in infected areas. It is probable
that the mosquitoes would not bite after the dog's coat had been rubbed
with paraffin: or mosquito netting might be placed over the kennels,
especially at night time. The larval forms were found microscopically in
the blood, and one mature form in the heart."

We were too careful about killing animals. I have explained how
Campbell's party was landed at Evans Coves. Some of the party wanted to
kill some seals on the off chance of the ship not turning up to relieve
them. This was before they were in any way alarmed. But it was decided
that life might be taken unnecessarily if they did this—and that winter
this party nearly died of starvation. And yet this country has allowed
penguins to be killed by the million every year for Commerce and a
farthing's worth of blubber.

We never killed unless it was necessary, and what we had to kill was used
to the utmost both for food and for the scientific work in hand. The
first Emperor penguin we ever saw at Cape Evans was captured after an
exciting chase outside the hut in the middle of a blizzard. He kept us
busy for days: the zoologist got a museum skin, showing some variation
from the usual coloration, a skeleton, and some useful observation on the
digestive glands: the parasitologist got a new tape-worm: we all had a
change of diet. Many a pheasant has died for less.

There were plenty of Weddell seal round us this winter, but they kept out
of the wind and in the water for the most part. The sea is the warm place
of the Antarctic, for the temperature never falls below about 29° Fahr.,
and a seal which has been lying out on the ice in a minus thirty
temperature, and perhaps some wind, must feel, as he slips into the sea,
much the same sensations as occur to us when we walk out of a cold
English winter day into a heated conservatory. On the other hand, a
seaman went out into North Bay to bathe from a boat, in the full sun of a
mid-summer day, and he was out almost as soon as he was in. One of the
most beautiful sights of this winter was to see the seals, outlined in
phosphorescent light, swimming and hunting in the dark water.

We had lectures, but not as many as during the previous winter when they
became rather excessive: and we included outside subjects. We read in
many a polar book of the depressions and trials of the long polar night;
but thanks to gramophones, pianolas, variety of food, and some study of
the needs both of mind and body, we suffered very little from the first
year's months of darkness. There is quite a store of novelty in living in
the dark: most of us I think thoroughly enjoyed it. But a second winter,
with some of your best friends dead, and others in great difficulties,
perhaps dying, when all is unknown and every one is sledged to a
standstill, and blizzards blow all day and all night, is a ghastly
experience. This year there was not one of our company who did not
welcome the return of the sun with thankfulness: all the more so since he
came back to a land of blizzards and made many of our difficulties more
easy to tackle. Those who got little outside exercise were more affected
by the darkness than others. This last year, of course, the difficulties
of getting sufficient outdoor exercise were much increased. Variety is
important to the man who travels in polar regions: at all events those
who went away on sledging expeditions stood the life more successfully
than those whose duties tied them to the neighbourhood of the hut.

Other things being equal, the men with the greatest store of nervous
energy came best through this expedition. Having more imagination, they
have a worse time than their more phlegmatic companions; but they get
things done. And when the worst came to the worst, their strength of mind
triumphed over their weakness of body. If you want a good polar traveller
get a man without too much muscle, with good physical tone, and let his
mind be on wires—of steel. And if you can't get both, sacrifice physique
and bank on will.

NOTE

A lecture given at this time by Wright on Barrier Surfaces is especially
interesting with relation to the Winter Journey and the tragedy of the
Polar Party. The general tend of friction set up by a sledge-runner upon
snow of ordinary temperature may be called true
sliding
friction: it is
probable that the runners melt to an infinitesimal degree the millions of
crystal points over which they glide: the sledge is running upon water.
Crystals in such temperatures are larger and softer than those
encountered in low temperatures. It is now that halos may be seen in the
snow, almost reaching to your feet as you pull, and moving forward with
you: we steered sometimes by keeping these halos at a certain angle to
us. My experience is that the best pulling surface is at an air
temperature of about +17° Fahr.: Wright's experience is that below +5°
during summer temperatures on the Barrier the surface is fairly good,
that between +5° and +15° less good, and between +15° and +25° best. The
worst is from +25° upwards, the worst of all being round about freezing
point.

As the temperature became high the amount of ice melted by this sliding
friction was excessive. It was then that we found ice forming upon the
runners, often in almost microscopic amounts, but nevertheless causing
the sledges to drag seriously. Thus on the Beardmore we took enormous
care to keep our runners free from ice, by scraping them at every halt
with the back of our knives. This ice is perhaps formed when the runners
sink into the snow to an unusual depth, at which the temperature of the
snow is sufficiently low to freeze the water previously formed by
friction or radiation from the sun on to a dark runner.

In very low temperatures the snow crystals become very small and very
hard, so hard that they will scratch the runners. The friction set up by
runners in such temperatures may be known as
rolling
friction, and the
effect, as experienced by us during the Winter Journey and elsewhere, is
much like pulling a sledge over sand. This rolling friction is that of
snow crystal against snow crystal.

If the barometer is rising you get flat crystals on the ice, if it is
falling you get mirage and a blizzard. When you get mirage the air is
actually coming out of the Barrier. Thus far Wright's lecture.

Since we returned I have had a talk with Nansen about the sledge-runners
which he recommends to the future explorer. The ideal sledge-runner
combines lightness and strength. He tells me that he would always have
metal runners in high temperatures in which they will run better than
wood. In cold temperatures wood is necessary. Metal is stronger than wood
with same weight. He has never used, but he suggests the possible use of,
aluminium or magnesium for the metal. And he would also have wooden
runners with metal runners attached, to be used alternately, if needed.

The Discovery Expedition used German silver, and it failed: Nansen
suggests that the failure was due to the fact that these runners were
fitted at home. The effect of this is that the wood shrinks and the
German silver is not quite flat: the fitting should be done on the spot.
Nansen did this himself on the Fram, and the result was excellent.
(I
believe that these Discovery runners were not a continuous strip of metal
but were built up in strips, which tore at the points of junction.)
Before it is fitted, German silver should be heated red hot and allowed
to cool. This makes it more ductile, like lead, and therefore less
springy: the metal should be as thin as possible.

As runners melt the crystals and so run on water, metal is unsuitable for
cold snow. For low temperatures, therefore, Nansen would have wooden
runners under the metal, the metal being taken off when cold conditions
obtained. He would choose such wood as is the best conductor of heat. He
tried birch wood in the first crossing of Greenland, but would not
recommend it as being too easily broken. In the use of oak, ash, maple,
and doubtless also hickory, for runners, the rings of growth of the tree
should be as far apart as possible: that is to say, they should be fast
growing. Ash with narrow rings breaks. There is ash and ash: American ash
is no good for this purpose; some Norwegian ash is useful, and some not.
Our own sledges with ash runners varied enormously. The runners of a
sledge should curve slightly, the centre being nearest to the snow. The
runners of ski should curve also slightly, in this case upwards in the
centre, i.e. from the snow. This is done by the way the wood is cut.
Wood always dries with the curve from the heart towards the outside of
the tree.

During our last year we had six new Norwegian sledges twelve feet long,
brought down by the ship, with tapered runners of hickory which were 3¾
inches broad in the fore part and 2¼ inches only at the stern. I believe
that this was an idea of Scott, who considered that the broad runner in
front would press down a path for the tapered part which followed, the
total area of friction being much less. We took one of them into South
Bay one morning and tried it against an ordinary sledge, putting 490 lbs.
on each of them. The surface included fairly soft as well as harder and
more rubbly going. There was no difference of opinion that the sledge
with the tapered runners pulled easier, and later we used these sledges
on the Barrier with great success.

If some instrument could be devised to test sledges in this way it would
be of very great service. No team of men can make an exact estimate of
the run of their own sledge, let alone the sledge which your pony or your
dogs are pulling. Yet sledges vary enormously, and it would be an
excellent thing for a leader to be able to test his sledges before buying
them, and also to be able to pick out the best for his more important
sledge journeys. I believe it can be done by attaching some kind of
balance between the sledge and the men pulling it.

Other points mentioned by Nansen are as follows:

Tarred ski are good: the snow does not stick so much. [This probably
refers to the Norwegian compound known as Fahrt.] But he does not
recommend tarred runners for sledges. Having had experience of a tent of
Chinese silk which would go into his pocket but was very cold, he
recommends a double tent, the inner lining being detached so that ice
could be shaken from both coverings. He suggests the possibility of a
woollen lining being warmer than cotton or silk or linen. I am, however,
of opinion that wool would collect more moisture from the cooker, and it
certainly would be far more difficult to shake off the ice. For four men
he would have two two-men sleeping-bags and a central pole coming down
between them, and the floor-cloth made in one piece with the tent. For
three men a three-man sleeping-bag: e.g. for such a journey as our
Winter Journey. He would not brush rime, formed upon the tent by the
steam from the cooker and breath, from the inside of tent before striking
camp. The more of it the warmer. He considers that two- or three-men
sleeping-bags are infinitely warmer than single bags: objections of
discomfort are overcome, for you are so tired you go to sleep anyway. I
would, however, recommend the explorer to read Scott's remarks upon the
same subject before making up his mind.
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