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Only days later, yet another holiday was festively observed. June 22, Midwinter's Day, was commemorated with a feast and after-dinner entertainment. Hurley erected a stage decorated with bunting and set up acetylene footlights. An overture, “Discord Fantasia in four flats,” was performed by the Billabong Band, while James offered the most successful sketch of the evening, appearing as Herr Professor von Schopenbaum to give a Dissertation on The Calorie.

“Very witty & truly unintelligible,” Worsley wrote appreciatively. After midnight, the company sang “God Save the King” and wished one another well for the days ahead.

Midwinter Dinner, 22 June 1915

“Dinner at 6-0 Roast Pork stewed apples & preserves peas with plum pudding.” (McNish, diary)

“From within the cosiness of the Ritz, it is hard to imagine we are drifting, frozen and solid in a sea of pack ice in the heart of the Weddell Sea,” Hurley wrote. Yet, he added, “I often wonder what is to become of it all.” His words imply that certain possibilities were not discussed, even as the creaking, booming sounds of distant pressure were carried through the crisp air to the stricken ship.

By the end of June, the Endurance had drifted more than 670 miles since her entrapment, and each mile brought her closer to the open water beyond the pack, and to the prospect of freedom. The hours of daylight were now increasing appreciably, and the men could look forward to seeing the sun again. Dog exercising became easier with the returning light, and concerts and lantern slide lectures continued as entertainment.

After several days of clear calm, a strong gale arose on July 12 and grew into a full-blown blizzard on July 13. The ship quivered as the pressure ground around her. Wild and Worsley were visiting with Shackleton in his cabin.

“The wind howled in the rigging,” Worsley recalled, “and I couldn't help thinking that it was making just the sort of sound that you would expect a human being to utter if he were in fear of being murdered.” In the lulls of the wind, the three men listened to the grinding of ice against the ship's sides. It was now that Shackleton shared what he had known for many months.

“The ship can't live in this, Skipper,” he said, pausing in his restless march up and down the small cabin. “You had better make up your mind that it is only a matter of time. It may be a few months, and it may be only a question of weeks, or even days … but what the ice gets, the ice keeps.”

Worsley reports that he received this news with despair and incredulity, and it is difficult to tell whether, in the few remaining months ahead, he regarded the loss of his ship as truly inevitable. He was, in his way, a more incurable optimist than Shackleton.

But Shackleton knew, and what Shackleton knew Wild took on faith. The men left their meeting and went back to the old routine, betraying nothing.

“It is bitterly cold and no one is allowed away from the ship,” Hurley wrote the following day. “We are not anxious however. The alluring cosiness of the Ritz being too enticing.” On the opposite side of the Ritz, however, McNish was writing in his diary from a very different perspective.

“We had a slight shock last night or this morning early,” the old seaman wrote. “At least there was a noise under the bottom aft the same as if the ice had broken up

Crew of the Endurance

“The keel is jamed & there is no way in clearing it but at present everything is quiet & we are freezing in again but there is a lot of craks around the floe Hurley took a groupe of all hands on Wednesday.” (McNish, diary)

I jumped on deck but we could not find out what it was the Boss thinks it was a whale but I think different.”

On July 21, amid heavy pressure, Shackleton ordered the decks cleared in the event the dogs had to be evacuated from the breaking ice; hourly watches were set throughout the night. The following day, Worsley rushed into the Ritz to announce that the ice had cracked some thirty yards ahead of them. All hands donned Burberrys