it for fifty miles until 11 am. The cliffs in the morning were 20 ft.
high, and by noon they had increased to 110 and 115 ft. The brow
apparently rose 20 to 30 ft. higher. We were forced away from the
barrier once for three hours by a line of very heavy pack-ice.
Otherwise there was open water along the edge, with high loose pack to
the west and north-west. We noticed a seal bobbing up and down in an
apparent effort to swallow a long silvery fish that projected at least
eighteen inches from its mouth. The noon position was lat. 73° 13´ S.,
long. 20° 43´ W., and a sounding then gave 155 fathoms at a distance of
a mile from the barrier. The bottom consisted of large igneous
pebbles. The weather then became thick, and I held away to the
westward, where the sky had given indications of open water, until 7
p.m., when we laid the ship alongside a floe in loose pack. Heavy snow
was falling, and I was anxious lest the westerly wind should bring the
pack hard against the coast and jam the ship. The 'Nimrod' had a
narrow escape from a misadventure of this kind in the Ross Sea early in
1908.

We made a start again at 5 a.m. the next morning (January 12) in
overcast weather with mist and snow-showers, and four hours later broke
through loose pack-ice into open water. The view was obscured, but we
proceeded to the south-east and had gained 24 miles by noon, when three
soundings in lat. 74° 4´ S., long. 22° 48´ W. gave 95, 128, and 103
fathoms, with a bottom of sand, pebbles, and mud. Clark got a good
haul of biological specimens in the dredge. The 'Endurance' was now
close to what appeared to be the barrier, with a heavy pack-ice foot
containing numerous bergs frozen in and possibly aground. The solid ice
turned away towards the north-west, and we followed the edge for 48
miles N. 60° W. to clear it.