My orders were to proceed inland, due south, taking magnetic, geographical, meteorological, and such other observations as were possible, returning to the Hut not later than January 15. Dr. Mawson had left it to my discretion, in the event of any great change occurring in the declination, to go either true or magnetic south. At the Hut and up to about sixty miles south of it, the declination had proved fairly constant, but now at the Southern Cross Depot, as we had christened the sixty-seven-mile camp, the compass, from pointing a little to the east of south, had travelled to 40 degrees east of south, so that it became obvious that there was considerable magnetic disturbance in the country over which we were travelling. Whether we went south or south-east seemed unlikely to affect the value of geographical and other information we might gather, while Webb was of the opinion that the best magnetic results would be obtained by marching directly towards the Magnetic Pole, particularly if there were disturbances over the intervening area. For these reasons the course was maintained magnetic south. At 11 A.M. on Sunday, November 24, we moved off to the south-east in a wind of fifty miles an hour. The light was bad, and steering had to be done by sastrugi and wind. However, momentary glimpses of the sun served to check the course. The lunch camp was five miles from the depot, and a good mound with a top of black bunting was left there. At almost every halt, thus far on our journey, the snow cut for pitching the tent had been gathered up into a mound which, in addition to forming a landmark, could often be used as a back-mark for checking the course. Our depot thus had a mound four miles on the southern and five miles on the northern side of it. It was not marked as well as I had hoped, but under the circumstances we could not do better. Moreover, at intervals during the day, some very distinctive snow ramps had appeared in the valley, some five miles to the north-east, and their position was fixed relative to the course. Our hopes for a good afternoon were disappointed, as the wind and drift came up again as strong as ever. The surface, too, grew worse; nothing but sastrugi eighteen inches to thirty inches high and very close together. We were marching a little to the east of the wind, and the sledge was continually blown sideways, making considerable leeway. By 8.30 P.M. it was blowing sixty miles per hour, so we halted, thoroughly tired out, having hauled our one-third of a ton eight and three-quarter miles.