The West Mountains were superb in their wild grandeur.

The whole outline of peaks, some eighty or ninety distant, showed up, stencilled in delicate contrast to the sky-line.
The immense ice-slopes shone white as alabaster against dark shadows.
The sky to the west over the mountains was clear, except for low-lying banks at the foot of the slopes round about Mount Discovery.

To the south hard streaks of stratus lay heaped up to 30 degrees above the horizon....

Then Erebus commenced to emit volumes of smoke, which rose hundreds of feet and trailed away in a north-westerly direction.

The southern slopes of Erebus were enveloped in a mass of cloud." The party from Cape Royds returned that afternoon, and there was disappointment at their report that no more tobacco had been found.
The sledging of stores to Hut Point, in preparation for the depot- laying journeys on the Barrier, was to begin on September 1.
Mackintosh, before that date, had discussed plans fully with the members of his party.