“We are now reduced to one meal in the twenty-four hours,” wrote Mackintosh a day later.  “This going without food keeps us colder.  It is a rotten, miserable time.  It is bad enough having this wait, but we have also the wretched thought of having to use the provisions already depot-ed, for which we have had all this hard struggle.”  The weather cleared on the 27th, and in the afternoon Mackintosh and Joyce went back to the depot, while Wild remained behind to build a cairn and attempt to dry the sleeping-bags in the sun.  The stores left at the depot had been two and a quarter tins of biscuit (42 lbs. to the tin), rations for three men for three weeks in bags, each intended to last one week, and three tins of oil.  Mackintosh took one of the weekly bags from the depot and returned to the camp.  The party resumed the homeward journey the next morning, and with a sail on the sledge to take advantage of the southerly breeze, covered nine miles and a half during the day.  But the dogs had reached almost the limit of their endurance; three of them fell out, unable to work longer, while on the march.  That evening, for the first time since leaving the ‘Aurora’, the men saw the sun dip to the horizon in the south, a reminder that the Antarctic summer was nearing its close.

The remaining four dogs collapsed on March 2.  “After lunch we went off fairly well for half an hour.  Then Nigger commenced to wobble about, his legs eventually giving under him.  We took him out of his harness and let him travel along with us, but he has given us all he can, and now can only lie down.  After Nigger, my friend Pompey collapsed.  The drift, I think, accounts a good deal for this.  Pompey has been splendid of late, pulling steadily and well.  Then Scotty, the last dog but one, gave up.  They are all lying down in our tracks.  They have a painless death, for they curl up in the snow and fall into a sleep from which they will never wake.  We are left with one dog, Pinkey.  He has not been one of the pullers, but he is not despised.  We can afford to give him plenty of biscuit.  We must nurse him and see if we cannot return with one dog at least.  We are now pulling ourselves, with the sail (the floor-cloth of the tent) set and Pinkey giving a hand.  At one stage a terrific gust came along and capsized the sledge.  The sail was blown off the sledge, out of its guys, and we prepared to camp, but the wind fell again to a moderate breeze, so we repaired the sledge and proceeded.

“It is blowing hard this evening, cold too.  Another wonderful sunset.  Golden colours illuminate the sky.  The moon casts beautiful rays in combination with the more vivid ones from the dipping sun.  If all was as beautiful as the scene we could consider ourselves in some paradise, but it is dark and cold in the tent and I shiver in a frozen sleeping-bag.  The inside fur is a mass of ice, congealed from my breath.  One creeps into the bag, toggles up with half-frozen fingers, and hears the crackling of the ice.  Presently drops of thawing ice are falling on one’s head.  Then comes a fit of shivers.  You rub yourself and turn over to warm the side of the bag which has been uppermost.  A puddle of water forms under the body.  After about two hours you may doze off, but I always wake with the feeling that I have not slept a wink.”