When, however, I went ashore again I found that the little shore-party had not only managed to get all the heavy timber that had been landed up to the site of the hut, but also had stacked the cases of provisions, which previously had been lying on the snow slope, upon bare land. While we were engaged on the increasingly difficult task of landing stores, &c., the hut-party were working day and night and the building was rapidly assuming an appearance of solidity. The uprights were in and the brace ties were fastened together, so that if it began to blow there was small fear of the structure being destroyed. This was something to be thankful for, but while the hut-party were getting on so well, we who were engaged on landing the stores had--owing to the breaking away of the ice--to move our spot. The stores had now to be dragged a distance of nearly three hundred yards from the ship to the landing-place, but this work was made easier by our being able to use four of the ponies. A large amount of stores was landed in this way, but a new and serious situation arose through the breaking away of the main ice-foot. Prudence suggested that it would be wiser to shift the stores already landed to a safer place before discharging any more from the ship, and on this work we were engaged during the evening of the 10th. [Illustration: The "Nimrod" lying off the Penguin Rookery, Cape Royds] Next we had to find a safer place on which to land the rest of the coal and stores, and Back Door Bay, as we named the chosen spot, became our new depot. This was a still longer journey from the ship, but there was no help for it, and after laying a tarpaulin on the rocks to keep the coal from mixing with the earth, we started landing the coal. By this time there were several ugly looking cracks in the bay ice, and these kept opening and closing, having a play of seven or eight inches between the floes. We improvised bridges, from the motor-car case, so that the ponies could cross the cracks, and presently were well under way with the work. Then there was a most alarming occurrence, for suddenly and without the slightest warning the greater part of the bay ice opened out into floes, and the whole mass that had opened started to drift slowly out to sea. The ponies on the ice were at once in a perilous position, but the sailors rushed to loosen the one tied to the stern rope and got it over the first crack, and Armytage also got the pony which he was looking after from the floe nearest the ship on to the next floe. Just, however, at that moment, Mackay appeared round the corner from Back Door Bay with a third pony attached to an empty sledge, on his way back to the ship to load up. Orders were shouted to him not to come any further, but not at first grasping the situation he continued to advance over the ice, which was already breaking away more rapidly.