I fear we have shipped up; a close shave; I am writing a few letters which I hope will be delivered some day.  I want to thank you for the friendship you gave me of late years, and to tell you how extraordinarily pleasant I found it to serve under you.  I want to tell you that I was not too old for this job.  It was the younger men that went under first...  After all we are setting a good example to our countrymen, if not by getting into a tight place, by facing it like men when we were there.  We could have come through had we neglected the sick.

Good-bye, and good-bye to dear Lady Bridgeman.

Yours ever,

R. SCOTT.

Excuse writing—­it is -40 deg., and has been for nigh a month.

TO VICE-ADMIRAL SIR GEORGE LE CLEARC EGERTON.  K.C.B.

MY DEAR SIR GEORGE,

I fear we have shot our bolt—­but we have been to Pole and done the longest journey on record.

I hope these letters may find their destination some day.

Subsidiary reasons of our failure to return are due to the sickness of different members of the party, but the real thing that has stopped us is the awful weather and unexpected cold towards the end of the journey.

This traverse of the Barrier has been quite three times as severe as any experience we had on the summit.

There is no accounting for it, but the result has thrown out my calculations, and here we are little more than 100 miles from the base and petering out.

Good-bye.  Please see my widow is looked after as far as Admiralty is concerned.

R. SCOTT.

My kindest regards to Lady Egerton.  I can never forget all your kindness.

TO MR. J.J.  KINSEY—­CHRISTCHURCH

March 24th, 1912.

MY DEAR KINSEY,

I’m afraid we are pretty well done—­four days of blizzard just as we were getting to the last depot.  My thoughts have been with you often.  You have been a brick.  You will pull the expedition through, I’m sure.

My thoughts are for my wife and boy.  Will you do what you can for them if the country won’t.

I want the boy to have a good chance in the world, but you know the circumstances well enough.

If I knew the wife and boy were in safe keeping I should have little regret in leaving the world, for I feel that the country need not be ashamed of us—­our journey has been the biggest on record, and nothing but the most exceptional hard luck at the end would have caused us to fail to return.  We have been to the S. pole as we set out.  God bless you and dear Mrs. Kinsey.  It is good to remember you and your kindness.

Your friend,
R. SCOTT.

Letters to his Mother, his Wife, his Brother-in-law (Sir William Ellison Macartney), Admiral Sir Lewis Beaumont, and Mr. and Mrs. Reginald Smith were also found, from which come the following extracts: