Shipwreck at the Bottom of the World: List 5

by Jennifer Armstrong
This nonfiction work tells the amazing survival story of Ernest Shackleton and his crew after their ship Endurance sank in Antarctica in 1914.

This list covers "Dry Land"–"Epilogue."

Here are links to our lists for the book: List 1, List 2, List 3, List 4, List 5
40 words 42 learners

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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. throng
    a large gathering of people
    Elephant Island had been named years earlier for the throngs of elephant seals that crowded its rocky shores.
  2. stupefied
    in a state of mental numbness as resulting from shock
    For the first several hours on land, the men ate, slept, and ate again, standing around in small groups, stupefied and silent.
  3. understatement
    something said in a restrained way for ironic contrast
    “But I’ve looked round a bit and—well, it’s not much like the Riviera.”
    It was quite an understatement.
  4. grim
    harshly uninviting or formidable in manner or appearance
    Grim black cliffs reached up 800 feet into the fog at their backs, and the 2,500-foot peaks behind those were covered with glaciers and snow.
  5. cormorant
    large, dark-colored, long-necked seabird
    Cormorants, skuas, and Cape pigeons wheeled in and out of the mist.
  6. lichen
    a plant occurring in crusty patches on tree trunks or rocks
    Patches of orange lichen made the only bright color, and a high-water mark on the cliff walls showed that their landing site was not at all safe.
  7. threadbare
    thin and tattered with age
    Sharp, sudden gusts carried away some of their stores the moment they were set down and ripped one of the threadbare tents to shreds.
  8. desolate
    providing no shelter or sustenance
    Shackleton knew—everyone knew—that they could not hold out on that desolate spot all winter. The seals and penguins might not last, and even if they made it to summer, whaling ships rarely came anywhere near Elephant Island: no one knew to look for them there.
  9. seasoned
    rendered competent through trial and experience
    Worsley must go along: no one else was capable of the navigating that this journey would require, and his experience with small boats was unmatched. Crean, the seasoned explorer, was fit to go.
  10. steadfast
    marked by firm determination or resolution; not shakable
    Shackleton also chose Tim McCarthy, one of the seamen who had remained cheerful and steadfast through all their troubles, and who was young and strong.
  11. ballast
    any heavy material used to stabilize a ship or airship
    Canvas bags were stitched together from sails and filled with 1,000 pounds of rocks for ballast, and two kegs were filled with glacier melt for drinking water.
  12. bouillon
    a clear seasoned broth
    The boat’s stores would include one of the Primus camp stoves, six weeks’ worth (for six men) of sledging rations for “hoosh,” and some bouillon cubes, sugar, powdered milk, and biscuits.
  13. gunwale
    a plank or ridge at the top of the side of a boat
    It was a tossup which was worse—being pounded up and down in the bow of the boat in a sorry excuse for sleep, or huddling in the cockpit as icy seas swept across the thwarts and gunwales.
  14. resiliency
    an occurrence of rebounding or springing back
    “We saw and felt that the James Caird had lost her resiliency,” Shackleton said later. “She was not rising to the oncoming seas. The weight of the ice was having its effect, and she was becoming more like a log than a boat.”
  15. chafe
    tear or wear off the skin or make sore by abrading
    Their legs were rubbed raw from the chafing of their wet pants.
  16. capsize
    overturn accidentally
    For an hour they labored to keep the water from capsizing the Caird.
  17. vista
    the visual percept of a region
    “We were a tiny speck in the vast vista of the sea,” Shackleton wrote later.
  18. scud
    run or move very quickly or hastily
    At noon the fog lifted into low clouds that scudded across their bows from the west-northwest.
  19. tussock
    a bunch of hair, feathers, or growing grass
    They sailed ahead and by three o’clock could make out the faint patches of green tussock grass that grew among the snowy rocks.
  20. fjord
    a long narrow inlet of the sea between steep cliffs
    Worsley, Vincent, Crean, and McCarthy took turns at their two oars, pulling the boat forward and trying to get into the long fjord.
  21. countenance
    the human face
    But when he applied the same process to his face, he succeeded only in smearing his entire countenance with a more even layer of shiny black grease.
  22. fuddle
    cause to be confused or perplexed
    Fuddled with sleep, Shackleton pointed at the black wall behind them. “It’s just going to break on us,” he warned, still caught in a dream of monster waves.
  23. as the crow flies
    by the shortest and most direct route
    No, the men could not do 130 miles in the Caird. But as the crow flies—that was only twenty-nine miles across the island.
  24. formidable
    inspiring fear or dread
    The Alps of the Southern Ocean were just as formidable as any mountain range, and they were unmapped.
  25. crevasse
    a deep fissure
    The footing was sometimes tricky, and all were weak. Deep crevasses snaked across their path from time to time.
  26. buffet
    strike against forcefully
    Icefalls glittered in the sun below them as a hard breeze buffeted their faces.
  27. slog
    walk heavily and firmly, as when weary, or through mud
    As they slogged their way through the snow, a strange feeling began to grow on each of the men.
  28. providence
    the guardianship and control exercised by a deity
    “When I look back at those days,” Shackleton added, “I do not doubt that Providence guided us...I know that during that long march of thirty-six hours over the unnamed mountains and glaciers of South Georgia it often seemed to me that we were four, not three.”
  29. limbo
    the state of being disregarded or forgotten
    “Pain and aches, boat journeys, marches, hunger and fatigue seemed to belong to the limbo of forgotten things, and there remained only the perfect contentment that comes of work accomplished.”
  30. clamber
    climb awkwardly, as if by scrambling
    Gentoo penguins and elephant seals ogled them as they began clambering over boulders along the shore.
  31. pervasive
    spreading or spread throughout
    Around the men was the familiar pervasive stench of the whaling factory—smelling almost as bad as they did themselves.
  32. ominous
    threatening or foreshadowing evil or tragic developments
    Just weeks earlier, on March 24, 1916, an ominous message from her radio had been picked up in Australia: HULL SEVERELY STRAINED.
  33. speculate
    talk over conjecturally, or review in an idle or casual way
    At first the men had speculated about how soon they could possibly expect a rescue ship.
  34. lenient
    not strict
    Wild was lenient with the men, knowing that being too strict would make their hard life even more unbearable.
  35. gangrene
    the localized death of living cells
    The most important medical task that faced them was Blackborrow’s frostbitten toes. His right foot recovered, but on his left foot gangrene had set in in the toes.
  36. palatial
    relating to or being a large and stately residence
    “My name is Frankie Wild-o, my hut’s on Elephant Isle.
    The wall’s without a single brick, the roof’s without a tile.
    But nevertheless, you must confess, for many and many a mile,
    It’s the most palatial dwelling place you’ll find on Elephant Isle.”
  37. reminisce
    recall the past
    Each night he read one recipe aloud to the crew, and at the end of the recitation the men spent hours discussing the recipe, comparing it to others they had known, reminiscing about meals they had enjoyed back home.
  38. barter
    exchange goods without involving money
    Food was traded to get out of chores: no one liked going outside into the cold to get frozen meat for the hoosh pot, but bartering a penguin steak could usually get a man out of the job.
  39. mollusk
    aquatic invertebrate, often with a shell
    Clark was so fed up with the daily diet of penguin hoosh that he began searching the shore for anything else that could be eaten; occasionally he found limpets (a kind of mollusk) and an edible variety of seaweed to add to the pot.
  40. baffle
    hinder or prevent, as an effort, plan, or desire
    Here’s to the long white road that beckons,

    The climb that baffles, the risk that nerves.

    And here’s to the merry heart that reckons

    The rough with the smooth and never swerves.
Created on Thu Jun 16 19:47:13 EDT 2022 (updated Tue Aug 23 09:38:48 EDT 2022)

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