Endurance: battling all odds

• Literary Term: jargon- the specialized language or vocabulary of a particular group or profession
• example: "The jib was removed from the mainmast, and the reefed lugsail and mizzen were run up."
• Quote: "But sufficiently provoked, there is hardly a creature on God's earth that ultimately won't turn and attempt to fight, regardless of the odds."
• Shackleton and a mere five other men were attempting to make their way through waters that were feared world-wide.  Huge ships still stood the chance of being sunk, let alone a tiny lifeboat manned by six men.  Often we underestimate a human's will to survive.  The odds that the Caird would make it to South Georgia was nearly one in a million.  The sea threw everything it had at the men: storms, blizzards, monstrous waves, raging winds.  Nothing, however, could stop them.  Ironically, each man went into the journey to South Georgia expecting to die.  This acceptance, however, did not and would not stop them from fighting for their lives even to their deaths.  They were battling the savage sea, and were somehow surviving each attack.  Miraculously, Shackleton and his men made it to the shores of South Georgia.