“…both [islands] exactly on the bearings I had said they would be; and Sir Ernest congratulates me on the accuracy of my navigation under circumstances of some difficulty and after 2 days of Dead Reckoning, while working in and out amongst pack ice with no very accurate means of taking Compass courses & lying to for 2 nights at the mercy of the winds and currents.”
— Frank Worsley
“Welcome dawn and with it something even more welcome, a glimpse of land! Clarence and Elephant Islands immediately ahead some 30 miles. What a contrast to the terrors of the night. Calm and peaceful the sun rose from out the ocean, with the promised land ahead, tipping the peaks of Clarence Island, till it resembled a vast gilt pyramid, peering through the pink mists of dawn. As Elephant appeared closest, it was decided to make all speed for its shores. With a light fair breeze, the three boats made fair progress, but at noon, the breeze calming, we took to rowing. How anxiously we watched the land gradually loom closer and the details of snowy peaks assume finite detail.”
— Frank Hurley
“It was for me, and I expect for all of us, an unforgettable day – the wind torn cloudy sky, great banks of cumulus with shafts of sunlight breaking through, the vast ocean with curling white horses… the Caird leaping away ahead, and behind us the gallant little Wills at one moment outlined against the sky on the top of a crest, and the next falling into the trough so that we could only see the top of her mast.”
– Alexander Macklin
Rime of the Ancient Mariner
by Samuel Taylor Coleridge
[…]
Four
‘I fear thee, ancient Mariner!
I fear thy skinny hand!
And thou art long, and lank, and brown,
As is the ribbed sea-sand.
I fear thee and thy glittering eye,
And thy skinny hand, so brown.’–
Fear not, fear not, thou Wedding-Guest!
This body dropt not down.
Alone, alone, all, all alone,
Alone on a wide wide sea!
And never a saint took pity on
My soul in agony.
The many men, so beautiful!
And they all dead did lie:
And a thousand thousand slimy things
Lived on; and so did I.
I looked upon the rotting sea,
And drew my eyes away
I looked upon the rotting deck,
And there the dead men lay
I looked to Heaven, and tried to pray;
But or ever a prayer had gusht,
A wicked whisper came, and made
My heart as dry as dust.
I closed my lids, and kept them close,
And the balls like pulses beat;
For the sky and the sea, and the sea and the sky
Lay like a load on my weary eye,
And the dead were at my feet.
The cold sweat melted from their limbs,
Nor rot nor reek did they:
The look with which they looked on me
Had never passed away.
An orphan’s curse would drag to hell
A spirit from on high;
But oh! more horrible than that
Is the curse in a dead man’s eye!
Seven days, seven nights saw that curse,
And yet I could not die.
The moving Moon went up the sky,
And no where did abide:
Softly she was going up,
And a star or two beside–
Her beams bemocked the sultry main,
Like April hoar-frost spread;
But where the ship’s huge shadow lay,
The charm’ed water burnt alway
A still and awful red.
Beyond the shadow of the ship,
I watched the water-snakes:
They moved in tracks of shining white
And when they reared, the elfish light
Fell off in hoary flakes.
Within the shadow of the ship
I watched their rich attire:
Blue, glossy green, and velvet black,
Then coiled and swam; and every track
Was a flash of golden fire.
O happy living things! no tongue
Their beauty might declare:
A spring of love gushed from my heart,
And I blessed them unaware:
Sure my kind saint took pity on me,
And I blessed them unaware.
The self-same moment I could pray;
And from my neck so free
The Albatross fell off, and sank
Like lead into the sea.
[…]
“But some smiles were caused even then by the plight of one man, who had a habit of accumulating bits of food against the day of starvation that he seemed always to think was at hand, and who was condemned now to watch impotently while hungry comrades with undisturbed stomachs made biscuits, rations, and sugar disappear with extraordinary rapidity.”
— Ernest Shackleton, South
Killer whale and Weddell seal, photo by Robert Pitman
“All around we could hear the killers blowing, their short, sharp hisses sounding like sudden escapes of steam. The killers were a source of anxiety, for a boat could easily have been capsized by one of them coming up to blow. They would throw aside in a nonchalant fashion pieces of ice much bigger than our boats when they rose to the surface, and we had an uneasy feeling that the white bottoms of the boats would look like ice from below. Shipwrecked mariners drifting in the Antarctic seas would be things not dreamed of in the killers’ philosophy…”
– Ernest Shackleton, South
“I am mildly superstitious of numbers, for this day had well nigh made an end to us all. During the morning the three boats were running under sail with a fair SE wind which developed into a half gale by noon, with a treacherous cross sea. The heavily laden boats were driven before it and were forced into the open sea… Throughout the night the boats were continually shipping seas, which broke over and froze on to them. The ice had to be chipped away hourly. The Wills being in an especially bad way, ice forming on her fo’c’sle head and keeping her down at the bows… All were in sort need of water. Our wet condition, the agonizing cold and the need of sleep, made life well nigh unbearable; furthermore, we were without any definite bearings as to our position. Never was dawn more anxiously awaited, never did night seem so long. Never do I wish to endure such a night. Sir E. and self snuggling together for warmth.”
— Frank Hurley
“Other articles of our scanty equipment had to go that night. We were carrying only the things that had seemed essential, but we stripped now to the barest limits of safety.
“Many things regarded by us as essentials at that time were to be discarded a little later as the pressure of the primitive became more severe.
“Man can sustain life with very scanty means. The trappings of civilization are soon cast aside in the face of stern realities, and given the barest opportunity of winning food and shelter, man can live and even find his laughter ringing true.”
– Ernest Shackleton, South
“Beautiful sunshiny morning. The pack radiant with the pink flush of sunrise, and resembling the ruins of empyrean marble cities. With fair NW wind, the James Caird, Dudley Docker and Stancombe Wills made SW course, our object being King George Island… This position caused grave anxiety, for in spite of strong wind from NE and our sailing SW, we have drifted considerably eastward… drifting in a sea of loose brash ice and newly formed pancakes. The boats, in order not to lose each other, remained tethered together. Everyone was wet and achingly cold. When there was sufficient light to enable safe navigation, the painters were cast adrift and with the SW wind, our destination was changed for Elephant Island…”
— Frank Hurley
“An unexpected horror was added to our already sufficient discomforts by the presence of a large school of killer whales which surrounded us on every side like fat bulls of Basan. Their blood-curdling blast, now coming from the distant darkness, now right alongside the boat, seemed to bring one face to face with the great leviathan and every now and then we could see their sinister black forms diving like submarines beneath our frail boats. These deadly creatures, more rapacious than sharks, would have made short work of a boat’s crew had they chanced to upset us.”
— Thomas Orde-Lees
Shackleton. 