Endurance Part 3: 1-3, Lansing

Since the men had to stay on the soggy floe for fear of breaking through the ice at any time, they decided to name the floe "Mark Time Camp". The rations of food were quickly being diminished, so Shackleton made the executive decision to have each of the dog sled teams slaughtered in order to preserve food. Dogs would be used for labor one day, and then be killed the very next. Most of the men used maxims when writing in their diaries. Macklin wrote in his diary, " 'My dogs will be shot tomorrow' " (Lansing, 107).  Men could sense when their dog team would be killed. Tempers start to flare between men over small things because all of the men are anxious to reach a safer floe. By the end of the section, rations of food are dangerously low, and the men might have to eat raw seal for food, because they have no blubber for fuel. All of the crew become pessimistic and believe that the land that they were aiming to land on, Paulet Island, is already far out of reach.