In this way he got sufficient warmth to enable him to sleep. Towards
morning he awoke with the idea that he must make something in the way
of a flag to attract the notice of people on shore, and to show them
that there was someone in distress on the ice.
The question was, how to make a flagstaff? I wonder whether a Boy
Scout could have seen a way?
Grenfell took the frozen legs of the three dead dogs, and bound them
together with strips of raw hide, and thus manufactured a staff, on to
which he then tied his shirt to act as a flag. It worked very well
till the sun rose, and then the legs began to melt a little, and the
flagstaff became a very wobbly one; and, as the Doctor describes it,
"almost tied itself into knots."
Like a true Scout, Grenfell never despaired; he kept thinking out
different ways by which he might survive the danger.
He thought of setting light to some unravelled rope by using a piece
of ice to act as a burning glass. In this way he hoped to attract the
attention of the people on shore by a smoke signal; but, while he was
busy preparing it, he saw the distant sparkle of what looked like an
oar from a boat, presently he saw it again, and soon he could see the
boat itself.
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