The Worst Journey in the World

nside was pandemonium. Most men had gone to bed, and I have a blurred

memory of men in pyjamas and dressing-gowns getting hold of me and

trying to get the chunks of armour which were my clothes to leave my body.

Finally they cut them off and threw them into an angular heap at the foot

of my bunk. Next morning they were a sodden mass weighing 24 lbs. Bread

and jam, and cocoa; showers of questions; "You know this is the hardest

journey ever made," from Scott; a broken record of George Robey on the

gramophone which started us laughing until in our weak state we found it

difficult to stop. I have no doubt that I had not stood the journey as well as

Wilson: my jaw had dropped when I came in, so they tell me. Then into my

warm blanket bag, and I managed to keep awake just long enough to think

that Paradise must feel something like this.

We slept ten thousand thousand years, were wakened to find everybody at

breakfast, and passed a wonderful day, lazying about, half asleep and wholly

happy, listening to the news and answering questions. "We are looked upon

as beings who have come from another world. This afternoon I had a shave

3 APSLEY CHERRY-GARRARD

after soaking my face in a hot sponge, and then a bath. Lashly had already

cut my hair. Bill looks very thin and we are all very blear-eyed from want of

sleep. I have not much appetite, my mouth is very dry and throat sore with

a troublesome hacking cough which I have had all the journey. My taste is

gone. We are getting badly spoiled, but our beds are the height of all our

pleasures."[168]

But this did not last long:

"Another very happy day doing nothing. After falling asleep two or three

times I went to bed, read Kim, and slept. About two hours after each meal

we all want another, and after a tremendous supper last night we had an-

other meal before turning in. I have my taste back but all our fingers are im-

possible, they might be so many pieces of lead except for the pins and needles

feeling in them which we have also got in our feet. My toes are very bulbous

and some toe-nails are coming off. My left heel is one big burst blister. Go-

ing straight out of a warm bed into a strong wind outside nearly bowled me

over. I felt quite faint, and pulled myself together thinking it was all nerves:

but it began to come on again and I had to make for the hut as quickly as

possible. Birdie is now full of schemes for doing the trip again next year. Bill

says it is too great a risk in the darkness, and he will not consider it, though

he thinks that to go in August might be possible."[169]

And again a day or two later:

"I came in covered with a red rash which is rather ticklish. My ankles and

knees are a bit puffy, but my feet are not so painful as Bill's and Birdie's.

Hands itch a bit. We must be very weak and worn out, though I think Birdie

is the strongest of us. He seems to be picking up very quickly. Bill is still