SAGA OF THE DISCOVERY' By L. C. Bernacchi Captain Scott's
t Discovery,' now moored at Temple Stairs for all to see, is a historic ship in the tradition of Drake's ' Golden Hind ' and Franklin's Erebus ' and Terror.' Now her saga has been told for the first time (Blackie, los. 6c1.) by the physicist on her first voyage. The book would be interesting if it were no more than the biography of a great ship, but it has more value than that. For it includes excellent first-hand descriptions of the Antarctic continent, its animals and flowers and fossils and climate, and a fascinating account of the whale research on which the ' Discovery ' was engaged in 1925-27. Nor does Lieut.-Commander Bernacchi neglect the human side ; he throws many interesting side-lights on the characters of his companions, Scott, Shackleton and Wilson among others. The lighter side of life in the Antarctic comes out in several vignettes, like the story of the Antarctic-born pups which on their return to a warmer climate nearly died of thirst because they had been brought up to drink ice, and the picture of the expedition's botanist growing anti-scorbutics in the shape of mustard and cress reared on precious spadefuls of soil and pieces of flannel. The Discovery ' has achieved years of valuable work, including that half-forgotten but highly successful first expedition of Scott's in 1901-4, and this book is a worthy memorial to her and the men who sailed in her.
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