Still, helped by the bigger rations—which did not amount to anything approaching full rations—we marched thirteen and a quarter geographical miles and reached 88° 7′ south. But at night I had to admit that this must be our last outward march, though I determined that we would make one more rush south with the flag. With what feelings of sadness I came to this decision I cannot even try to describe. Only one thing softened our grievous disappointment, and that was the conviction that we had striven to the very limit of our strength, and had not given in until the forces of nature combined with our scanty supply of food had conquered us.
Two days, however, had to be passed in our bags before we could make the final dash with the flag, days of shrieking blizzard and piercing cold, days in which our valuable food was going without our marching, and in which we had a gloomy foreboding that our tracks, to which we were trusting mainly to find our depot, might drift up.
Truly we realised that we had taken a most serious risk, and that we were in a most critical situation, but we were partly sustained by the fact that, at any rate, we had played the game to the last and utmost.
With 72° of frost the wind cut searchingly into our thin tent, and even the drift found its way on to our bags, which were wet enough already. Cramp kept on attacking us, and every now and then a frozen foot had to be nursed into life again by placing it inside the shirt and next to the skin of the sufferer's almost as suffering neighbour. To add to our dreariness we had nothing to read, as we had depoted our little books so that we might save weight.
The Farthest South Camp after sixty hours' Blizzard. (See page 144)
We had honestly and truly shot our bolt at last, and when the wind dropped about midnight we were soon up and ready to struggle forward a little further and hoist the flag as near to the South Pole as we could possibly bear it.
At 9 A.M. on January 9 we were in latitude 88° 23' south, longitude 162° east, half running and half walking over a surface much hardened by the recent blizzard, and it was indeed strange to us to go along without the nightmare of that heavy sledge dragging behind us.
Soon the time came when we had to hoist Her Majesty's flag and afterwards the other Union Jack, and then we took possession of the plateau in the name of His Majesty. And while the Union Jack blew out stiff in the icy gale which was still cutting us to the bone, we looked south with our powerful glasses, but could see nothing but the dead white snow plain.
No break in the plateau was to be seen as it extended toward the Pole, and we felt absolutely sure that the goal which we had struggled for—and failed to reach—lay on this plain.