5 June 1911 – 11 June 1911

The wind has been S. all day, sky overcast and air misty with snow crystals. The temperature has gone steadily up and to-night rose to + 16°. Everything seems to threaten a blizzard which cometh not. But what is to be made of this extraordinary high temperature heaven only knows. Went for a walk over the rocks and found it very warm and muggy. Taylor gave us a paper on the Beardmore Glacier. He has taken pains to work up available information; on the ice side he showed the very gradual gradient as compared with the Ferrar. If crevasses are as plentiful as reported, the motion of glacier must be very considerable. There seem to be three badly crevassed parts where the glacier is constricted and the fall is heavier. Geologically he explained the rocks found and the problems unsolved. The basement rocks, as to the north, appear to be reddish and grey granites and altered slate (possibly bearing fossils). The Cloudmaker appears to be diorite; Mt. Buckley sedimentary. The suggested formation is of several layers of coal with sandstone above and below; interesting to find if it is so and investigate coal. Wood fossil conifer appears to have come from this—better to get leaves—wrap fossils up for protection. Mt. Dawson described as pinkish limestone, with a wedge of dark rock; this very doubtful! Limestone is of great interest owing to chance of finding Cambrian fossils (Archeocyathus). He mentioned the interest of finding here, as in Dry Valley, volcanic cones of recent date (later than the recession of the ice). As points to be looked to in Geology and Physiography: 1. Hope Island shape. 2. Character of wall facets. 3. Type of tributary glacierscliff or curtain, broken. 4. Do tributaries enter 'at grade'? 5. Lateral gullies pinnacled, &c., shape and size of slope. 6. Do tributaries cut out gullies—empty unoccupied cirques, hangers, &c. 7. Do upland moraines show tesselation? 8. Arrangement of strata, inclusion of. 9. Types of moraines, distance of blocks. 10. Weathering of glaciers. Types of surface. (Thrust mark? Rippled, snow stool, glass house, coral reef, honeycomb, ploughshare, bastions, piecrust.) 11. Amount of water silt bands, stratified, or irregular folded or broken. 12. Cross section, of valleys 35° slopes? 13. Weather slopes debris covered, height to which. 14. Nunataks, height of rounded, height of any angle in profile, erratics. 15. Evidence of order in glacier delta. Debenham in discussion mentioned usefulness of small chips of rock—many chips from several places are more valuable than few larger specimens. We had an interesting little discussion. I must enter a protest against the use made of the word 'glaciated' by Geologists and Physiographers. To them a 'glaciated land' is one which appears to have been shaped by former ice action. The meaning I attach to the phrase, and one which I believe is more commonly current, is that it describes a land at present wholly or partly covered with ice and snow. I hold the latter is the obvious meaning and the former results from a piracy committed in very recent times. The alternative terms descriptive of the different meanings are ice covered and ice eroded. To-day I have been helping the Soldier to design pony rugs; the great thing, I think, is to get something which will completely cover the hindquarters.

The temperature has been as high as +19° to-day; the south wind persisted until the evening with clear sky except for fine effects of torn cloud round about the mountain. To-night the moon has emerged from behind the mountain and sails across the cloudless northern sky; the wind has fallen and the scene is glorious. It is my birthday, a fact I might easily have forgotten, but my kind people did not. At lunch an immense birthday cake made its appearance and we were photographed assembled about it. Clissold had decorated its sugared top with various devices in chocolate and crystallised fruit, flags and photographs of myself. After my walk I discovered that great preparations were in progress for a special dinner, and when the hour for that meal arrived we sat down to a sumptuous spread with our sledge banners hung about us. Clissold's especially excellent seal soup, roast mutton and red currant jelly, fruit salad, asparagus and chocolate—such was our menu. For drink we had cider cup, a mystery not yet fathomed, some sherry and a liqueur. After this luxurious meal everyone was very festive and amiably argumentative. As I write there is a group in the dark room discussing political progress with discussions—another at one corner of the dinner table airing its views on the origin of matter and the probability of its ultimate discovery, and yet another debating military problems. The scraps that reach me from the various groups sometimes piece together in ludicrous fashion. Perhaps these arguments are practically unprofitable, but they give a great deal of pleasure to the participants. It's delightful to hear the ring of triumph in some voice when the owner imagines he has delivered himself of a well-rounded period or a clinching statement concerning the point under discussion. They are boys, all of them, but such excellent good-natured ones; there has been no sign of sharpness or anger, no jarring note, in all these wordy contests! all end with a laugh. Nelson has offered Taylor a pair of socks to teach him some geology! This lulls me to sleep!

A very beautiful day. In the afternoon went well out over the floe to the south, looking up Nelson at his icehole and picking up Bowers at his thermometer. The surface was polished and beautifully smooth for ski, the scene brightly illuminated with moonlight, the air still and crisp, and the thermometer at -10°. Perfect conditions for a winter walk. In the evening I read a paper on 'The Ice Barrier and Inland Ice.' I have strung together a good many new points and the interest taken in the discussion was very genuine—so keen, in fact, that we did not break up till close on midnight. I am keeping this paper, which makes a very good basis for all future work on these subjects. (See Vol. II.) Shelters to Iceholes Time out of number one is coming across rediscoveries. Of such a nature is the building of shelters for iceholes. We knew a good deal about it in the Discovery, but unfortunately did not make notes of our experiences. I sketched the above figures for Nelson, and found on going to the hole that the drift accorded with my sketch. The sketches explain themselves. I think wall 'b' should be higher than wall 'a.' My night on duty. The silent hours passed rapidly and comfortably. To bed 7 A.M.

Did not turn out till 1 P.M., then with a bad head, an inevitable sequel to a night of vigil. Walked out to and around the bergs, bright moonlight, but clouds rapidly spreading up from south. Tried the snow knife, which is developing. Debenham and Gran went off to Hut Point this morning; they should return to-morrow.

No wind came with the clouds of yesterday, but the sky has not been clear since they spread over it except for about two hours in the middle of the night when the moonlight was so bright that one might have imagined the day returned. Otherwise the web of stratus which hangs over us thickens and thins, rises and falls with very bewildering uncertainty. We want theories for these mysterious weather conditions; meanwhile it is annoying to lose the advantages of the moonlight. This morning had some discussion with Nelson and Wright regarding the action of sea water in melting barrier and sea ice. The discussion was useful to me in drawing attention to the equilibrium of layers of sea water. In the afternoon I went round the Razor Back Islands on ski, a run of 5 or 6 miles; the surface was good but in places still irregular with the pressures formed when the ice was 'young.' The snow is astonishingly soft on the south side of both islands. It is clear that in the heaviest blizzard one could escape the wind altogether by camping to windward of the larger island. One sees more and more clearly what shelter is afforded on the weather side of steep-sided objects. Passed three seals asleep on the ice. Two others were killed near the bergs.

The impending blizzard has come; the wind came with a burst at 9.30 this morning. Simpson spent the night turning over a theory to account for the phenomenon, and delivered himself of it this morning. It seems a good basis for the reference of future observations. He imagines the atmosphere A C in potential equilibrium with large margin of stability, i.e. the difference of temperature between A and C being much less than the adiabatic gradient. In this condition there is a tendency to cool by radiation until some critical layer, B, reaches its due point. A stratus cloud is thus formed at B; from this moment A B continues to cool, but B C is protected from radiating, whilst heated by radiation from snow and possibly by release of latent heat due to cloud formation. The condition now rapidly approaches unstable equilibrium, B C tending to rise, A B to descend. Owing to lack of sun heat the effect will be more rapid in south than north and therefore the upset will commence first in the south. After the first start the upset will rapidly spread north, bringing the blizzard. The facts supporting the theory are the actual formation of a stratus cloud before a blizzard, the snow and warm temperature of the blizzard and its gusty nature. It is a pretty starting-point, but, of course, there are weak spots. Atkinson has found a trypanosome in the fish—it has been stained, photographed and drawn—an interesting discovery having regard to the few species that have been found. A trypanosome is the cause of 'sleeping sickness.' The blizzard has continued all day with a good deal of drift. I went for a walk, but the conditions were not inviting. We have begun to consider details of next season's travelling equipment. The crampons, repair of finnesko with sealskin, and an idea for a double tent have been discussed to-day. P.O. Evans and Lashly are delightfully intelligent in carrying out instructions.

A fine clear morning, the moon now revolving well aloft and with full face. For exercise a run on ski to the South Bay in the morning and a dash up the Ramp before dinner. Wind and drift arose in the middle of the day, but it is now nearly calm again. At our morning service Cherry-Garrard, good fellow, vamped the accompaniment of two hymns; he received encouraging thanks and will cope with all three hymns next Sunday. Day by day news grows scant in this midwinter season; all events seem to compress into a small record, yet a little reflection shows that this is not the case. For instance I have had at least three important discussions on weather and ice conditions to-day, concerning which many notes might be made, and quite a number of small arrangements have been made. If a diary can be so inadequate here how difficult must be the task of making a faithful record of a day's events in ordinary civilised life! I think this is why I have found it so difficult to keep a diary at home.