CHAPTER I


SOUTH POLAR EXPEDITION--OUTFIT AND AIMS


It is nine years since the last supporting party bid farewell to Captain
Scott and his four brave companions, whose names are still fresh in the
memory of those who were interested in Captain Scott's last Polar
Expedition. The Great War has come and gone and the majority of us wish
to forget it, but the story of Scott undoubtedly appeals still to a great
number of people. It is a good story, and my only hope is that I can
retell it well enough to make my volume worth while reading after so much
has already been published concerning the work of the British Antarctic
Expedition of 1910.

The main object of our expedition was to reach the South Pole and secure
for the British nation the honour of that achievement, but the attainment
of the Pole was far from being the only object in view, for Scott
intended to extend his former discoveries and bring back a rich harvest
of scientific results. Certainly no expedition ever left our shores with
a more ambitious scientific programme, nor was any enterprise of this
description ever undertaken by a more enthusiastic and determined
personnel. We should never have collected our expeditionary funds merely
from the scientific point of view; in fact, many of our largest
supporters cared not one iota for science, but the idea of the Polar
adventure captured their interest. On the other hand, a number of our
supporters affected a contempt for the Polar dash and only interested
themselves in the question of advanced scientific study in the Antarctic.
As the expedition progressed, however, the most unenthusiastic member of