South! Ernest Shackleton (affordable ebook reader .TXT) 📖

barred. The Yelcho had arrived at the right moment. Two days earlier she could not have reached the island, and a few hours later the pack may have been impenetrable again. Wild had reckoned that help would come in August, and every morning he had packed his kit, in cheerful anticipation that proved infectious, as I have no doubt it was meant to be. One of the party to whom I had said “Well, you all were packed up ready,” replied, “You see, boss, Wild never gave up hope, and whenever the sea was at all clear of ice he rolled up his sleeping-bag and said to all hands, ‘Roll up your sleeping-bags, boys; the boss may come today.’ ” And so it came to pass that we suddenly came out of the fog, and, from a black outlook, in an hour all were in safety homeward bound. The food was eked out with seal and penguin meat, limpets, and seaweed. Seals had been scarce, but the supply of penguins had held out fairly well during the first three months. The men were down to the last Bovril ration, the only form of hot drink they had, and had scarcely four days’ food in hand at the time of the rescue. The camp was in constant danger of being buried by the snow, which drifted heavily from the heights behind, and the men moved the accumulations with what implements they could provide. There was danger that the camp would become completely invisible from the sea, so that a rescue party might look for it in vain.

“It had been arranged that a gun should be fired from the relief ship when she got near the island,” said Wild. “Many times when the glaciers were ‘calving,’ and chunks fell off with a report like a gun, we thought that it was the real thing, and after a time we got to distrust these signals. As a matter of fact, we saw the Yelcho before we heard any gun. It was an occasion one will not easily forget. We were just assembling for lunch to the call of ‘Lunch O!’ and I was serving out the soup, which was particularly good that day, consisting of boiled seal’s backbone, limpets, and seaweed, when there was another hail from Marston of ‘Ship O!’ Some of the men thought it was ‘Lunch O!’ over again, but when there was another yell from Marston lunch had no further attractions. The ship was about a mile and a half away and steaming past us. A smoke-signal was the agreed sign from the shore, and, catching up somebody’s coat that was lying about, I struck a pick into a tin of kerosene kept for the purpose, poured it over the coat, and set it alight. It flared instead of smoking; but that didn’t matter, for you had already recognized the spot where you had left us and the Yelcho was turning in.”

We encountered bad weather on the way back to Punta Arenas, and the little Yelcho laboured heavily; but she had light hearts aboard. We entered the Straits of Magellan on September 3 and reached Rio Secco at 8 a.m. I went ashore, found a telephone, and told the Governor and my friends at Punta Arenas that the men were safe. Two hours later we were at Punta Arenas, where we were given a welcome none of us is likely to forget. The Chilian people were no less enthusiastic than the British residents. The police had been instructed to spread the news that the Yelcho was coming with the rescued men, and lest the message should fail to reach some people, the fire-alarm had been rung. The whole populace appeared to be in the streets. It was a great reception, and with the strain of long, anxious months lifted at last, we were in a mood to enjoy it.

The next few weeks were crowded ones, but I will not attempt here to record their history in detail. I received congratulations and messages of friendship and good cheer from all over the world, and my heart went out to the good people who had remembered my men and myself in the press of terrible events on the battlefields. The Chilian Government placed the Yelcho at my disposal to take the men up to Valparaiso and Santiago. We reached Valparaiso on September 27. Everything that could swim in the way of a boat was out to meet us, the crews of Chilian warships were lined up, and at least thirty thousand thronged the streets. I lectured in Santiago on the following evening for the British Red Cross and a Chilian naval charity. The Chilian flag and the Union Jack were draped together, the band played the Chilian national anthem, “God Save the King,” and the “Marseillaise,” and the Chilian Minister for Foreign Affairs spoke from the platform and pinned an Order on my coat. I saw the President and thanked him for the help that he had given a British expedition. His Government had spent £4,000 on coal alone. In reply he recalled the part that British sailors had taken in the making of the Chilian Navy.

The Chilian Railway Department provided a special train to take us across the Andes, and I proceeded to Montevideo in order to thank personally the President and Government of Uruguay for the help they had given generously in the earlier relief voyages. We were entertained royally at various spots en route. We went also to Buenos Aires on a brief call. Then we crossed the Andes again. I had made arrangements by this time for the men and the staff to go to England. All hands were keen to take their places in the Empire’s fighting forces. My own immediate task was the relief of the marooned Ross Sea party, for news had come to me of the Aurora’s long drift in the Ross Sea and of