At the Mountains of Madness | Page 7

get as much as possible out of the ships and up the barrier with the single dog team we
had left there. A direct route across the unknown region between Lake and McMurdo
Sound was what we really ought to establish.
Lake called me later to say that he had decided to let the camp stay where Moulton's
plane had been forced down, and where repairs had already progressed somewhat. The
ice sheet was very thin, with dark ground here and there visible, and he would sink some
borings and blasts at that very point before making any sledge trips or climbing
expeditions. He spoke of the ineffable majesty of the whole scene, and the queer state of
his sensations at being in the lee of vast, silent pinnacles whose ranks shot up like a wall
reaching the sky at the world's rim. Atwood's theodolite observations had placed the
height of the five tallest peaks at from thirty thousand to thirty-four thousand feet. The
windswept nature of the terrain clearly disturbed Lake, for it argued the occasional
existence of prodigious gales, violent beyond anything we had so far encountered. His
camp lay a little more than five miles from where the higher foothills rose abruptly. I
could almost trace a note of subconscious alarm in his words-flashed across a glacial void
of seven hundred miles - as he urged that we all hasten with the matter and get the strange,
new region disposed of as soon as possible. He was about to rest now, after a continuous
day's work of almost unparalleled speed, strenuousness, and results.
In the morning I had a three-cornered wireless talk with Lake and Captain Douglas at
their widely separated bases. It was agreed that one of Lake's planes would come to my

base for Pabodie, the five men, and myself, as well as for all the fuel it could carry. The
rest of the fuel question, depending on our decision about an easterly trip, could wait for a
few days, since Lake had enough for immediate camp heat and borings. Eventually the
old southern base ought to be restocked, but if we postponed the easterly trip we would
not use it till the next summer, and, meanwhile, Lake must send a plane to explore a
direct route between his new mountains and McMurdo Sound.
Pabodie and I prepared to close our base for a short or long period, as the case might be.
If we wintered in the antarctic we would probably fly straight from Lake's base to the
Arkham without returning to this spot. Some of our conical tents had already been
reinforced by blocks of hard snow, and now we decided to complete the job of making a
permanent village. Owing to a very liberal tent supply, Lake had with him all that his
base would need, even after our arrival. I wirelessed that Pabodie and I would be ready
for the northwestward move after one day's work and one night's rest.
Our labors, however, were not very steady after 4 P.M., for about that time Lake began
sending in the most extraordinary and excited messages. His working day had started
unpropitiously, since an aeroplane survey of the nearly-exposed rock surfaces showed an
entire absence of those Archaean and primordial strata for which he was looking, and
which formed so great a part of the colossal peaks that loomed up at a tantalizing distance
from the camp. Most of the rocks glimpsed were apparently Jurassic and Comanchian
sandstones and Permian and Triassic schists, with now and then a glossy black
outcropping suggesting a hard and slaty coal. This rather discouraged Lake, whose plans
all hinged on unearthing specimens more than five hundred million years older. It was
clear to him that in order to recover the Archaean slate vein in which he had found the
odd markings, he would have to make a long sledge trip from these foothills to the steep
slopes of the gigantic mountains themselves.
He had resolved, nevertheless, to do some local boring as part of the expedition's general
program; hence he set up the drill and put five men to work with it while the rest finished
settling the camp and repairing the damaged aeroplane. The softest visible rock - a
sandstone about a quarter of a mile from the camp - had been chosen for the first
sampling; and the drill made excellent progress without much supplementary blasting. It
was about three hours afterward, following the first really heavy blast of the operation,
that the shouting of the drill crew was heard; and that young Gedney - the acting foreman
- rushed into the camp with the startling news.
They had struck a cave. Early in the boring the sandstone had given place to a vein of
Comanchian