We had ascertained that the 'Rachel Cohen' was still in Hobart, so on the 23rd I wirelessed asking when the boat was to sail. The reply came that the 'Rachel Cohen' was leaving Hobart on Thursday, June 26.
Our supply of kerosene oil was exhausted by the end of the month, despite the fact that the rule of "lights out at 10 P.M." had been observed for some time. Thus we were obliged to use sea elephant oil in slush lamps. At first we simply filled a tin with the oil and passed a rag through a cork floating on the top, but a little ingenuity soon resulted in the production of a lamp with three burners and a handle. This was made by Sandell out of an old tea-pot and one, two or three burners could be lit as occasion demanded. During meal times the whole three burners were used, but, as the oil smoked and smelt somewhat, we generally blew out two as soon as the meal was finished. This was the "general" lamp, but each man had, as well, one of his own invention. Mine was scornfully referred to as the "house-boat," since it consisted of a jam tin, which held the oil, standing in a herring tin which caught the overflow.
At the end of June, Blake and I surveyed all the penguin rookeries round about "The Nuggets" and, allowing a bird to the square foot, found that there must have been about half a million birds in the area. The sealers kill birds from these rookeries to the number of about one hundred and thirty thousand yearly, so that it would seem reasonable to suppose that, despite this fact, there must be an annual increase of about one hundred thousand birds.
The end of the month arrived and, on making inquiries, we found that there was no news of the 'Rachel Cohen' having left Hobart. We had enough flour to last a fortnight, and could not get any from the sealers as they possessed only three weeks' supply themselves. However, on July 8, Bauer came across and offered to let us have some wheatmeal biscuits as they had a couple of hundredweights, so I readily accepted twenty pounds of them. We now had soup twice a day, and managed to make it fairly thick by adding sago and a few lentils. Cornflour and hot water flavoured with cocoa made a makeshift blanc-mange, and this, with sago and tapioca, constituted our efforts towards dessert.
On the 12th I received a message stating that the 'Rachel Cohen' had sailed on July 7; news which was joyfully received. We expected her to appear in ten or twelve days.
On the 18th we used the last ounce of flour in a small batch of bread, having fully expected the ship to arrive before we had finished it. Next day Bauer lent us ten pounds of oatmeal and showed us how to make oatmeal cakes. We tried some and they were a complete success, though they consisted largely of tapioca, and, according to the respective amounts used, should rather have been called tapioca cakes.
When the 22nd arrived and no ship showed up, I went across to see what the sealers thought of the matter, and found that they all were of opinion that she had been blown away to the eastward of the island, and might take a considerable time to "make" back.
On this date we came to the end of our meats, which I had been dealing out in a very sparing manner, just to provide a change from sea elephant and weka. We had now to subsist upon what we managed to catch. There were still thirty-five tins of soup, of which only two tins a day were used, so that there was sufficient for a few weeks. But we found ourselves running short of some commodity each day, and after the 23rd reckoned to be without bread and biscuit.
At this juncture many heavy blows were experienced, and on the 24th a fifty-mile gale accompanied by a tremendous sea beat down on us, giving the 'Rachel Cohen' a very poor chance of "making" the island. Our last tin of fruit was eaten; twelve tins having lasted us since March 31, and I also shared the remaining ten biscuits amongst the men on the 24th. We were short of bread, flour, biscuits, meats, fish, jam, sugar and milk, but had twenty tins of French beans, thirty tins of cornflour, some tapioca, and thirty tins of soup, as well as tea, coffee and cocoa in abundance. We had not been able to catch any fish for some days as the weather had been too rough, and, further, they appeared to leave the coasts during the very cold weather.
Sea elephants were very scarce, and we invariably had to walk some distance in order to get one; each man taking it in turn to go out with a companion and carry home enough meat for our requirements. We were now eating sea elephant meat three times a day (all the penguins having migrated) and our appetites were very keen. The routine work was carried on, though a great deal of time was occupied in getting food.