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[page 138, continued:]
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CHAPTER XVI.
IT had been
Captain Guy's
original
intention, after satisfying himself about the Auroras, to proceed
through
the Strait of Magellan, and up along the western coast of Patagonia;
but
information received at Tristan d'Acunha induced him to steer to the
southward,
in the hope of falling in with some small islands said to lie about the
parallel of 60° S., longitude 41° 20' W. In the event of his
not
discovering these lands, he designed, should the season prove
favourable,
to push on towards the pole. Accordingly, on the twelfth of December,
we
made sail in that direction. On the eighteenth we found ourselves about
the station indicated by Glass, and cruised for three days in that
neighbourhood
without finding any traces of the islands he had mentioned. On the
twenty-first,
the weather being unusually pleasant, we again made sail to the
southward,
with the resolution of penetrating in that course as far as possible.
Before
entering upon this portion of my narrative, it may be as well, for the
information of those readers who have paid little attention to the
progress
of discovery in these regions, to give some brief account of the very
few
attempts at reaching the southern pole which have hitherto been made.
That of Captain Cook was the first of
which we
have
any distinct account. In 1772 he sailed to the south in the Resolution,
accompanied by Lieutenant Furneaux in the Adventure. In December he
found
himself as far as the fifty-eighth parallel of south latitude, and in
longitude [page
139:] 26° 57' E. Here he met with narrow fields of ice,
about eight or ten inches thick, and running northwest and southeast.
This
ice was in large cakes, and usually it was packed so closely that the
vessels
had great difficulty in forcing a passage. At this period Captain Cook
supposed, from the vast number of birds to be seen, and from other
indications,
that he was in the near vicinity of land. He kept on to the southward,
the weather being exceedingly cold, until he reached the sixty-fourth
parallel,
in longitude 38° 14' E. Here he had mild weather, with gentle
breezes,
for five days, the thermometer being at thirty-six. In January, 1773,
the
vessels crossed the Antarctic circle, but did not succeed in
penetrating
much farther; for, upon reaching latitude 67° 15', they found all
farther
progress impeded by an immense body of ice, extending all along the
southern
horizon as far as the eye could reach. This ice was of every variety —
and some large floes of it, miles in extent, formed a compact mass,
rising
eighteen or twenty feet above the water. It being late in the season,
and
no hope entertained of rounding these obstructions, Captain Cook now
reluctantly
turned to the northward.
In the November following he renewed
his search
in
the Antarctic. In latitude 59° 40' he met with a strong current
setting
to the southward. In December, when the vessels were in latitude
67°
31', longitude 142° 54' W., the cold was excessive, with heavy
gales
and fog. Here also birds were abundant; the albatross, the penguin, and
the peterel especially. In latitude 70° 23' some large islands of
ice
were encountered, and shortly afterward, the clouds to the southward
were
observed to be of a snowy whiteness, indicating the vicinity of field
ice.
In latitude 71° 10', longitude 106° 54' W., the navigators were
stopped, as before, by an immense frozen expanse, which filled the
whole
area of the southern horizon. The northern edge of this expanse was
ragged
and broken, so firmly wedged together as to be utterly impassible, and
extending about a mile to the southward. Behind it the frozen surface
was
comparatively smooth for some distance, until terminated in the [page
140:] extreme back-ground by gigantic ranges of ice
mountains,
the one towering above the other. Captain Cook concluded that this vast
field reached the southern pole or was joined to a continent. Mr. J. N.
Reynolds, whose great exertions and perseverance have at length
succeeded
in getting set on foot a national expedition, partly for the purpose of
exploring these regions, thus speaks of the attempt of the Resolution.
"We are not surprised that Captain Cook was unable to go beyond 71°
10', but we are astonished that he did attain that point on the
meridian
of 106° 54' west longitude. Palmer's Land lies south of the
Shetland,
latitude sixty-four degrees, and tends to the southward and westward
farther
than any navigator has yet penetrated. Cook was standing for this land
when his progress was arrested by the ice; which, we apprehend, must
always
be the case in that point, and so early in the season as the sixth of
January
— and we should not be surprised if a portion of the icy mountains
described
was attached to the main body of Palmer's Land, or to some other
portions
of land lying farther to the southward and westward."
In 1803, Captains Kreutzenstern and
Lisiausky
were
despatched by Alexander of Russia for the purpose of circumnavigating
the
globe. In endeavouring to get south, they made no farther than 59°
58', in longitude 70° 15' W. They here met with strong currents
setting
eastwardly. Whales were abundant, but they saw no ice. In regard to
this
voyage, Mr. Reynolds observes that, if Kreutzenstern had arrived where
he did earlier in the season, he must have encountered ice — it was
March
when he reached the latitude specified. The winds, prevailing, as they
do, from the southward and westward, had carried the floes, aided by
currents,
into that icy region bounded on the north by Georgia, east by Sandwich
Land and the South Orkneys, and west by the South Shetland islands.
In 1822, Captain James Weddell, of
the British
navy,
with two very small vessels, penetrated farther to the south than any
previous
navigator, and this too, without encountering extraordinary
difficulties.
He states that [page 141:] although he was
frequently
hemmed in by ice before reaching the seventy-second parallel,
yet,
upon attaining it, not a particle was to be discovered, and that, upon
arriving at the latitude of 74° 15', no fields, and only three
islands
of ice were visible. It is somewhat remarkable that, although vast
flocks
of birds were seen, and other usual indications of land, and although,
south of the Shetlands, unknown coasts were observed from the masthead
tending southwardly, Weddell discourages the idea of land existing in
the
polar regions of the south.
On the eleventh of January, 1823,
Captain
Benjamin
Morrell, of the American schooner Wasp, sailed from Kerguelen's Land
with
a view of penetrating as far south as possible. On the first of
February
he found himself in latitude 64° 52' S., longitude 118° 27' E.
The following passage is extracted from his journal of that date. "The
wind soon freshened to an eleven-knot breeze, and we embraced this
opportunity
of making to the west; being however convinced that the farther we went
south beyond latitude sixty-four degrees, the less ice was to be
apprehended,
we steered a little to the southward, until we crossed the Antarctic
circle,
and were in latitude 69° 15' E. In this latitude there was no
field
ice, and very few ice islands in sight.
Under the date of March fourteenth I
find also
this
entry. "The sea was now entirely free of field ice, and there were not
more than a dozen ice islands in sight. At the same time the
temperature
of the air and water was at least thirteen degrees higher (more mild)
than
we had ever found it between the parallels of sixty and sixty-two
south.
We were now in latitude 70° 14' S., and the temperature of the air
was forty-seven, and that of the water forty-four. In this situation I
found the variation to be 14° 27' easterly, per azimuth. . . . . I
have several times passed within the Antarctic circle on different
meridians,
and have uniformly found the temperature, both of the air and the
water,
to become more and more mild the farther I advanced beyond the
sixty-fifth
degree of south latitude, and that the variation decreases in the same
proportion. While north of this [page 142:]
latitude,
say between sixty and sixty-five south, we frequently had great
difficulty
in finding a passage for the vessel between the immense and almost
innumerable
ice islands, some of which were from one to two miles in circumference,
and more than five hundred feet above the surface of the water."
Being nearly destitute of fuel and
water, and
without
proper instruments, it being also late in the season, Captain Morrell
was
now obliged to put back, without attempting any farther progress to the
southward, although an entirely open sea lay before him. He expresses
the
opinion that, had not these overruling considerations obliged him to
retreat,
he could have penetrated, if not to the pole itself, at least to the
eighty-fifth
parallel. I have given his ideas respecting these matters somewhat at
length,
that the reader may have an opportunity of seeing how far they were
borne
out by my own subsequent experience.
In 1831, Captain Briscoe, in the
employ of the
Messieurs
Enderby, whale-ship owners of London, sailed in the brig Lively for the
South Seas, accompanied by the cutter Tula. On the twenty-eighth of
February,
being in latitude 66° 30' S., longitude 47° 31' E., he descried
land, and "clearly discovered through the snow the black peaks of a
range
of mountains running E. S. E." He remained in this neighbourhood during
the whole of the following month, but was unable to approach the coast
nearer than within ten leagues, owing to the boisterous state of the
weather.
Finding it impossible to make farther discovery during this season, he
returned northward to winter in Van Diemen's Land.
In the beginning of 1832 he again
proceeded
southwardly,
and on the fourth of February land was seen to the southeast in
latitude
67° 15', longitude 69° 29' W. This was soon found to be an
island
near the headland of the country he had first discovered. On the
twenty-first
of the month he succeeded in landing on the latter, and took possession
of it in the name of William IV., calling it Adelaide's Island, in
honour
of the English queen. These particulars being made known to the [page
143:] Royal Geographical Society of London, the conclusion
was
drawn by that body "that there is a continuous tract of land extending
from 47° 30' E. to 69° 29' W. longitude, running the parallel
of
from sixty-six to sixty-seven degrees south latitude." In respect to
this
conclusion Mr. Reynolds observes, "In the correctness of it we by no
means
concur; nor do the discoveries of Briscoe warrant any such inference.
It
was within these limits that Weddel proceeded south on a meridian to
the
east of Georgia, Sandwich Land, and the South Orkney and Shetland
Islands."
My own experience will be found to testify most directly to the falsity
of the conclusion arrived at by the society.
These are the principal attempts
which have been
made at penetrating to a high southern latitude, and it will now be
seen
that there remained, previous to the voyage of the Jane, nearly three
hundred
degrees of longitude in which the Antarctic circle had not been crossed
at all. Of course a wide field lay before us for discovery, and it was
with feelings of most intense interest that I heard Captain Guy express
his resolution of pushing boldly to the southward. |
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