The Fargo forum and daily republican. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1894-1957, 1913-04-25

0NEy EN0l SC11 oOH
mics a day. although working ten to
eleven hours. We did not get abreast
OF C~loudbreak mountain until the nth.
(the day that Amundsen started
homel, so that the snow cost us a
weeks advance"
In his final message to the public
which vas found with SCOTS BODY in
his tent, he speaks at the outset of this
period of high wind and soft snow as
one of the big misfortunes Of the en-
deavor. ~.
Probably, next to that hour of 3 q.
M Dec. Ia, when Amundsen reached
the south pole, his greatest triumph
was when the cable carried the news
or his victory to his king and to the
world. That was ON March 8, last, and
at that time Captain Scott and his
three, companions were e~xperiencing
the bitterest disapointments and suf-
fering. Evans had died, and already
Oates was enduring pain almost be-
yond human strength.
Il do not think human beings ever
came through sue a month as we have
come through" the dying Scott wrote
or that very period when the Fran
put into port at Hobart, and the news
OF Amundsen's success was flashed
around the world. The stories, genuine
or pirated, were still fresh in the minds
of all the civilized world when, in the
Aol SSNbiiN4h li0 uSluSs CdpLdl OdIpS
or the Inniskillen dragons, determin-
ed that he should never be a drag on
the chances of the others, said to them,
7 am just going outside and walked
into the teeth of the raging blizzard
to die, as Scott said he died, like a
brave man and an English gentleman"
Those were the things that Scott and
his men knew at the very time when
the first plaudits for Amundsen's
achievement were coming from every
land. BY March 20, when Scott and
the other two survivors of the party
were probably overcome, the Fran
had started on her way from Hobart
to Buenos Aires.
There is one last comparison to
make. On that day, Nov. IL, when
Wright's searching party, securing the
antarctic SHOWS for the lost leader n
companions, came upon SCOTS tent
and the three dead men within.
Amundsen had tasted the triumph of
a reception in Christiania and was
headed for London, where he was TO
address the Royal Geographical soci-
ETY..
Amundssn Never Short on Food.
Perhaps the most striking contrast
between the two narratives is in the
descriptions of the return trips. SCOTS
brief story of that final halt eleven
miles from the supplies that might
have saved them, with food almost
gone and the blizzard making furth-
er advance out of the q~uestiOn-this
brief story following the account of
the fearful cold Inc the-strong head
winds during the return trip when
they did not know what it was to have
one completely fine day-must be read
side by side with the story of Amund-
sens return. which was brief, not be-
cause he was weak from hunger and
exposure when he wrote it, but be-
cause it was too placidly uEeventful
to be worth telling. Witness the par
agraph he gave to 1t:
"On the return journey we had not
a single days rest. We did not even
rest on Christmas day, but passed on,
day after day, through all weathers.
There was little that was adventurous
about the trip, but it was very hard
work." .
The i~nefaceabIe picture. of Scott and
Wilson and Bowers dead from starva-
ton in the tent must be kept, histor-
ically beside Amundsen's graphic &C
count.
"Of real hardships in the way of
food on the pole journey there were
none. Rather the reverse, for when
my companions reached the ship they
were almost fat, and could not eat as
much as when they started. The dogs,
too, were fat and that they had lived
we'll during the last part Of the jour-
ney was shown by the fact that they
would hardly touch the seal meat,
which was lying in large quantities
about the base camp"
The matter of food differs markedly
in the two stories. Throughout SCOTS
story that he sent back on Jan. 3, 1912,
by Lieutenant Evans runs a constant
note of concern about the supplies,
which would probably not have p
peared in Amundsen's story, even had
his been written when the pole was
still some $50 miles ahead of him.
Scott wrote on Dec. II, after the loss
Of a week due to the soft snow and
fearful winds:
by programme / arranged to push
on from the S5th parallel with eight
men and twelve units of provisions,
but l hope to reserve a margin over
this. AS we stand, we are only half a
days food short o. programme and
should have a good chance of getting
through"
1t was with a months provisions
hat the party of five started south
from 1882 degrees on Jan. 8, with the
pole then only a fortnight's distance
off. Even despite his earlier anxiety,
Scott calculated later that the advance
party would have returned to the gla-
cier with a surplus of food had it not
bSSAA Iva NAAS IA NV AhJN&E "
Evans. He gave as n of the three
fatal misfortuneS the sickening of
Oates, the delaying storm and the
shortage of fuel in our depots"-the
fuel so necessary for the preparation
of food that might have saved them.
When that final message was written.
there was fuel for n hot meal and
food for two days"
Dogs at the Food Reserve.
Scott set down in his message that
he could not account for the shortage
at the depots. Amundsen. however.
foresaw and feared a tampering with
his depots and approached one of them
on the return with apprehension. He
gave this account:
"Three of the best dogs deserted the
party at 80 degrees. He a killed a
female dog at 82h degrees and the
dogs went back. searching for her.
This caused Is great anxiety, for 1t
was feared that the dogs would pillage
the depots. on which the party de-
pended. When we returned to SO de-
grees, after being at the pole, we saw
fresh dog tracks around the large
snow cairn used as a depot there.
CAUTIOUSLY enough, the pemmican in
the depot was untouched. Traces of
the dogs were followed to S2h degrees,
where the female dog had been killed.
They had found the body, which was
placed on a heap of snow, as a food
reserve for the party, and, having eat
IN it, the dogs had gone to the depot
at 80 degrees, where a large number
Of cases We're piled up. They had got
at one of the cases of pemmican and
had not only eaten that, but a also
eaten the leather straps and other in
digestible articles. They had also eat
en- two dogs which we had killed and
q &C "a - a -. ~ - -