Identifier: voyageofwhynotin00char (find matches)
Title: The voyage of the Why not?' in the Antarctic; the journal of the second French South polar expedition, 1908-1910
Year: 1911 (1910s)
Authors: Charcot, Jean, 1867-1936 Walsh, Philip
Subjects: Pourquoi-pas? (Ship)
Publisher: New York, London : Hodder and Stoughton
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Internet Archive

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h aching heart, that the whole con-formation of the pack-ice has altered and that we are blockedin fine and snug. There is nothing to do but to wait. Oneof the planks of the boat is stove in, others are so smashedand damaged by the ice that only a fraction of an inch keepsthe water out. It will not bear thinking about. We want to stretch ourselves out to sleep, but we havescarcely room, and without coverings or change of clothes,wet to our vests, and our socks soaking, we are pierced withcold. We have one tin of beef, and Gourdon finds a fewsticks of chocolate, which with two biscuits and a flask of rumconstitute all our provisions. With one accord we decidenot to touch them for the present. We settle down as best we can—and best is very bad inthe restricted space under the tent, which has holes in severalplaces—and try to sleep ; but the frightful coldness of ourfeet wakes us every minute, and my anxiety to extricate our-selves from this situation makes me rise a dozen times to72
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THE SUMMER OF 1908-1909 run to the summit of the reef. After three hours of this gameI notice a channel starting from some thin ice, once overwhich we shall be able to get back to the Berthelot Islands,where there was a cormorant-rookery in 1904. We mayeven find again the practicable channel along the coast. Butbefore reaching this thin ice there is a stretch covered by apile of icebergs and I cannot see what is in store for us there.So much the worse ; but we cannot stay here, exposed as weare to the.slightest shock of the ice. We must act. I awakenmy comrades, and once more we are off ! After many hard-ships, detours and shocks, we cross the iceberg-zone and thethin ice. There is some open water, to which we have beenlong strangers, and we reach the Berthelots. The cormorantsare still beside an old cairn of ours. At the last extremitywe could eat these raw, or singed by the aid of our spirit;for we have not seen a single seal to provide us with its fatfor fuel, and thus allow us to

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