Our sleeping-bags were getting really bad by now, and already it took a long time to thaw a way down into them at night.  Bill spread his in the middle, Bowers was on his right, and I was on his left.  Always he insisted that I should start getting my legs into mine before he started:  we were rapidly cooling down after our hot supper, and this was very unselfish of him.  Then came seven shivering hours and first thing on getting out of our sleeping-bags in the morning we stuffed our personal gear into the mouth of the bag before it could freeze:  this made a plug which when removed formed a frozen hole for us to push into as a start in the evening.

We got into some strange knots when trying to persuade our limbs into our bags, and suffered terribly from cramp in consequence.  We would wait and rub, but directly we tried to move again down it would come and grip our legs in a vice.  We also, especially Bowers, suffered agony from cramp in the stomach.  We let the primus burn on after supper now for a time—­it was the only thing which kept us going—­and when one who was holding the primus was seized with cramp we hastily took the lamp from him until the spasm was over.  It was horrible to see Birdie’s stomach cramp sometimes:  he certainly got it much worse than Bill or I. I suffered a lot from heartburn especially in my bag at nights:  we were eating a great proportion of fat and this was probably the cause.  Stupidly I said nothing about it for a long time.  Later when Bill found out, he soon made it better with the medical case.

Birdie always lit the candle in the morning—­so called and this was an heroic business.  Moisture collected on our matches if you looked at them.  Partly I suppose it was bringing them from outside into a comparatively warm tent; partly from putting boxes into pockets in our clothing.  Sometimes it was necessary to try four or five boxes before a match struck.  The temperature of the boxes and matches was about a hundred degrees of frost, and the smallest touch of the metal on naked flesh caused a frost-bite.  If you wore mitts you could scarcely feel anything—­especially since the tips of our fingers were already very callous.  To get the first light going in the morning was a beastly cold business, made worse by having to make sure that it was at last time to get up.  Bill insisted that we must lie in our bags seven hours every night.

In civilization men are taken at their own valuation because there are so many ways of concealment, and there is so little time, perhaps even so little understanding.  Not so down South.  These two men went through the Winter Journey and lived:  later they went through the Polar Journey and died.  They were gold, pure, shining, unalloyed.  Words cannot express how good their companionship was.

Through all these days, and those which were to follow, the worst I suppose in their dark severity that men have ever come through alive, no single hasty or angry word passed their lips.  When, later, we were sure, so far as we can be sure of anything, that we must die, they were cheerful, and so far as I can judge their songs and cheery words were quite unforced.  Nor were they ever flurried, though always as quick as the conditions would allow in moments of emergency.  It is hard that often such men must go first when others far less worthy remain.