thrown aside for its life. God had shown us the weakness of man's hand
and it was enough for the best of us,--the people who had been made such
a lot of lately--the whole scene was one of pathos really. However, at 11
P.M. Evans and I with the carpenter were able to crawl through a tiny
hole in the bulkhead, burrow over the coal to the pump-well cofferdam,
where, another hole having been easily made in the wood, we got down
below with Davy lamps and set to work. The water was so deep that you had
to continually dive to get your hand on to the suction. After 2 hours or
so it was cleared for the time being and the pumps worked merrily. I went
in again at 4.30 A.M. and had another lap at clearing it. Not till the
afternoon of the following day, though, did we see the last of the water
and the last of the great gale. During the time the pumps were working,
we continued the baling till the water got below the furnaces. As soon as
we could light up, we did, and got the other pumps under weigh, and, once
the ship was empty, clearing away the suction was a simple matter. I was
pleased to find that after all I had only lost about 100 gallons of the
petrol and bad as things had been they might have been worse....

"You will ask where all the water came from seeing our forward leak had
been stopped. Thank God we did not have that to cope with as well. The
water came chiefly through the deck where the tremendous strain,--not
only of the deck load, but of the smashing seas,--was beyond conception.
She was caught at a tremendous disadvantage and we were dependent for our
lives on each plank standing its own strain. Had one gone we would all
have gone, and the great anxiety was not so much the existing water as
what was going to open up if the storm continued. We might have dumped
the deck cargo, a difficult job at best, but were too busy baling to do
anything else....

"That Captain Scott's account will be moderate you may be sure. Still,