Monday, 5 February 1912

Scott

P.O. Evans was deteriorating rapidly. Bitterly disappointed over the loss of the Pole -- it would have meant financial security to him, promotion and the chance to open a little pub in a comfortable retirement -- he was now becoming listless and apathetic. [1]

Scott was not especially sympathetic towards invalids, and expected his men to bear their suffering with English stoicism. "Our faces are much cut up by all the winds we have had, mine least of all; the others tell me they feel their noses more going with than against the wind. Evans' nose is almost as bad as his fingers. He is a good deal crocked up," he noted, adding in a remarked edited out of the published journals, "and very stupid about himself." [2]

The Terra Nova arrived at Cape Evans. Simpson decided to change his plans and go home, handing over his work to Wright; Meares had already intended to take the ship back.

Debenham's Second Western Geological Party began trekking south, after waiting for the Terra Nova for twenty days.


Notes:

[1] Roland Huntford, in Scott and Amundsen (New York : Putnam, 1980, c1979), p.522, citing interviews with Tryggve Gran.
[2] R.F. Scott, diary, 5 February, 1912, quoted by Roland Huntford in Race for the South Pole : the expedition diaries of Scott and Amundsen (London : Continuum, c2010), p.271.