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Chapter 9 - The End of the Race

The Norwegians stayed two days at the Pole. They left a tent there, with a Norwegian flag on it. Inside the tent, they left some food, a letter for the King of Norway, and a letter for Scott.

They left some more black flags near the Pole, and one twenty-eight kilometres north. Then they skied away, back to the north.

It’s a beautiful day, Bjaaland wrote. The sun is warm, the snow isgood. But thedogs run too quickly-1 can’tget in front of them!

They found their depots easily. There were ten between the Pole and Framheim. Each depot had a lot of food. They laughed and skied quickly down the mountains. Often, they skied fifty kilometies a day. On Friday, January 26th, 1912, they came back to Framheim. It was four o’clock in the morning.

Inside the wooden house, Lindstrarm, the cook, was asleep.

Amundsen walked quietly to his bed. ‘Good morning, Lindstrerm,’ he said. ‘Is our coffee ready?’

The black flags waited at the Pole.

‘What’s that, Captain’ Bowers said. ‘Over there?’

‘Where’ Scott asked. ‘What - oh my God!’

They all saw the small black flag in the snow, two kilometres in front of them. Slowly, they pulled their sledge to it.

Next day, January 17th 1912, they found the tent and the Norwegian flag. Near it, Scott took the British flag from under his clothes, and put it up. In his diary, Scott wrote: This is a very bad day. We are all tired, and have cold feet and hands. It is -30°’ Centigrade and there is a snowstorm. Great God! This is an awful place!

They turned north. Five tired, unhappy men, in the coldest, emptiest place on earth.

On March 13th, 1912, Scott’s wife Kathleen, looked at her morning newspaper. NORWAY’S FLAG AT SOUTH POLE, it said. She looked at it for a long time, and then began to cry.

‘What’s the matter’ her friend asked.

‘My poor, poor husband,’ Mrs Scott said. ‘What’s happened to him? Where is he now?’

Scott’s men were always hungry. There were not many depots and they were difficult to find. We need to find the next depot today, Oates wrote. But how can we find one black flag in all this snow? It’s very difficult. And there is food for four men, not five.

They were all tired and ill, too. Oates’s feet were black now, and he could not feel them. On February 16th, Edgar Evans died.

On the 17th they were past the mountains. At the depot there they ate one of the dead ponies. Then they went on - ten, eleven, twelve kilometres a day. They were ill because their clothes were not warm and they didn’t have much food. The temperature was sometimes -40” Centigrade. .

On March 7th Scott looked at Oates’s feet. he^ were big and black. ‘I can’t pull the sledge now,’ Oates said. ‘It’s very difficult to walk. Am I going to lose these feet, Captain?’

Scott looked at Oates’s feet, and said’nothing. On March 9th they found another depot, but there was not much food. Slowly, they walked on. OatesIs feet were worse every day.

March 17th was Oates’s birthday. He was thirty-two. He lay in the tent and listened to the wind outside. He was very cold, very hungry, and very very tired.

He wrote a letter to his mother and gave it to Wilson. Then he got up, and opened the door of the tent. He stopped in the door for a minute. Scott, Wilson, and Bowers looked at him.

They didn’t speak.

‘I’m going outside for a minute,’ Oates said. ‘I may be some time.’

They didn’t see him again.

At Cape Evans, the Englishmen waited. On December llth, Meares and the dogs came back. On January 3rd, Teddy Evans and his two men arrived at Cape Evans. The Terra Nova came, and went. Winter began. Scott did not come.

The Englishmen waited all winter at Cape Evans. Then, on October 26th 1912, they started for the south. Two weeks later, they found a tent.

There were three bodies in the tent - Scott, Wilson, and Bowers. They put the bodies under the snow. Then they took the men’s letters and diaries, and went north to Cape Evans again.

In Scott’s diary they read: Oates died like a good Englishman.

We all did. Please, remember us, and look after our families. We did our best.

No one found Oates’s body. But he is there, somewhere, under the snow and the wind, in the coldest, emptiest place on earth.