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this continent a precipice of ice, varying | Dirck Gerritz, who, in his vessel of some from 100 to 150 feet in height, and present- 150 tons, was driven to them by storms in ing for some 500 miles an impervious bar- 1599 from the western entrance to the rier to the bowsprits of straits of Magellan. It is true that, nearly “Those sons of Albion who, with venturous sails, Gonneville had acquired the reputation of a century earlier, the French navigator De On distant oceans caught Antarctic gales:"— having discovered a Terra Australis far to these are in themselves objects which, how-the south of Africa. Doubts, however, ever briefly described or roughly sketched, have always hung over the precise position must take at once the highest rank among the natural wonders of the world.

of the country visited, if not discovered, by De Gonneville. It was reported extenBefore we proceed to cite the passages in sive and well inhabited, and he brought which these and other memorabilia of Sir away with him a son of its sovereign, an James's expedition are described, we think article of export which could hardly be obit advisable to give, as far as we are able, a tained from the neighborhood of the Anmeasure of this officer's performance by a tarctic circle This prince was adopted by sketch of those of his predecessors. With the Frenchman who had imported or kidrespect to the Arctic circle, this task has napped him, married, and had descendants afforded Sir John Barrow the materials of in France, one of whom, a grandson, bea valuable volume, to which, perhaps, some came a canon of Lisieux and an ambassaadditions might be obtained from the dor. It is to this person we owe an acrecent researches of the Society of Danish count of the voyage of De Gonneville. Antiquaries into the records of early Scan- He was, however, unable to bring any evidinavian navigation. A few lines may dence of the position of the land in quessuffice to convey all we know of Antarctic tion, which, having long been traced ad discovery anterior to the period of Wilkes, libitum on the maps of the Southern Ocean, D'Urville, and Ross. Many obvious causes remains still uncertain, though the probahave contributed to direct the attention of bilities of the case appear to be in favor of governments and independent navigators Madagascar. It was mainly in pursuit of rather to the North Pole than the South. this land, of which distance and uncertainThe dream of an available passage to Ca- ty had magnified the extent and resources, thay has been, like many other visions, that the Breton Kerguelen in 1772 empregnant with practical results. In Eng- barked on the expedition which led to the land, after these visions of mercantile ad- discovery, three years afterwards, acknowvantage had lost their influence, the official ledged and confirmed by Cook, of Kerguedirectors of maritime enterprise have still len Island. Of Captain Cook's expedition, been stimulated by the desire to resolve the thumbed as its record has been, and, we geographical problem of the North-west hope, continues to be, by school-boy hands, passage, and also to map out the configura- it is unnecessary to speak in detail. tion of the continent of North America, Down to 1840 we believe that no navigaand of the great adjacent masses of land- tor of any country but his own had penethus to finish off, as it were, a work which trated beyond the point marked as Cook's has been in progress since the days of furthest on the maps, or with the exception Baffin and Hudson-rather than to break of the Russian Bellinghausen, made any up new ground and seek for the conjectured material addition to his discoveries in those Terra Australis. With the exception of latitudes. Indeed of our own countrymen the expedition of Captain Cook, of which only one had fulfilled the former of these the exploration of the higher southern lati- conditions. This was Captain Weddell, tudes formed but an episode, the Antarctic who, in the year 1822, in a small vessel fitdepartment has, down to a recent period, ted for the whale and seal fishery rather been principally left to the casual efforts of than for discovery, first disproved the existthe whale and seal hunter. The earliest ence of a continental range which had been exploit of importance in its annals of supposed to extend itself immediately to the which any record has come under our notice, south of the islands discovered by Gerritz is the discovery of the islands which now and rediscovered by Smith, and then, purrather unfairly bear the name of the South suing his fortunes between the 30th and Shetland, situated about the 62d degree of 40th degrees of longitude, ran down to the south latitude. They should in justice highest southern latitude yet attained by bear the name of the honest Dutchman man, 749 15'. A passage in Weddell's

In 1830 and 1831 the brig Tula, of 148 tons, commanded by Captain Biscoe, prosecuted the task of discovery under special instructions from its enterprising owner, the great promoter of the southern whale fishery, Mr. C. Enderby. Biscoe did not, like Weddell, succeed in passing beyond the degree of south latitude which had formed the limit of Cook's progress, but, to use the words of the Journal of the Geographical Society, vol. iii., p. 122, he "made two distinct discoveries, at a great distance the one from the other, and each in the highest southern latitudes which, with a few exceptions, had yet been attained, or in which land had yet been discovered." These were, first, that of Enderby's Land, in lat. 65° 57', and long. 47° 20' east; and next, that of a range of islands, and of land of unknown extent, situated between the 67th and 63d degrees of south latitude, and between the 63d and 71st degrees of west longitude. The principal range of these islands bears the name of Biscoe.

narrative, in which he takes occasion to lament that he was ill-provided with instruments of scientific observation, may have given a pretext for the doubts which some foreign authorities have entertained as to the reality of this exploit. He told the world, however, that he had spent 2407. on the purchase of three chronometers, all of which performed well; and the whole tone of his narrative and of his observations on the subject of polar navigation, seem to us to bespeak the man of instruction and research as well as enterprise. Taking into account all the circumstances of his expedition, we venture to pronounce that his performance comes nearer to those of the giants of old times, the Baffins, the Davises, and the Hudsons, than any voyage of the present age accomplished without the assistance of governments. We endeavored at the time to set him in a proper light before his countrymen :--if it be true, as we fear it is, that a man of such achievement died in neglected poverty, let others bear the blame. A Russian expedition was fitted out from We find the distinguished name of Mr. Cronstadt in 1819, consisting of two ships, Enderby again associated with Antarctic the Vostock and the Mirui, under the com- discovery in the case of Balleny's voyage, mand of Captains Bellinghausen and Laza- 1839. This voyage demands our more parrew. An account of this expedition, in ticular notice, because its track was followed two volumes with an atlas, was published by Sir James Ross for special reasons in at St. Petersburgh; but, as far as we know, his two first cruises; because some quesit still remains locked up in the Russian tions have arisen between the American language. In January, 1821, they reached and English expeditions, in which the prethe latitude of 70S 30 which, in the "Rus-cise position of the islands discovered by sian Encyclopædia," is stated to be the Balleny is concerned; and lastly, because highest hitherto attained-but the state- there is every reason to suppose that land ment is incorrect, for it falls short of Cook's which D'Urville, in ignorance of Balleny's furthest. An island was discovered in lati-voyage, claims to have discovered, had been tude 68° 57' and longitude 90° 46' W., in fact seen by Balleny. We have, indeed, and called the island of Peter I. Floating ice prevented the vessels from approaching this land nearer than fourteen miles, but its insular character appears to have been ascertained, and the height of its summits was calculated at 4,200 feet. Their next discovery appears on the maps as Alexander's Island, in latitude 60° 43', longitude 73° 10' W. It would appear, however, that Bellinghausen was unable to trace the prolongation of this land to the south, and it has been considered as not improbable that it is continuous with the land afterwards discovered by Captain Biscoe, and designated as Graham's Land. Bellinghausen himself took care to call it Alexander's Land, not Alexander's Island. Be this as it may, to the Russian undoubtedly belonged the honor, previous to 1840, of having discovered the southernmost known land.

little doubt that should subsequent researches prove that the south pole is the centre of a vast continent, the outworks of which in some longitudes are to be found in the neighborhood of the 70th degree of south latitude, but indented by at least one bay to the height of the 79th, the first and second claimants to its discovery will be the gallant agents of Mr. Enderby, Captains Biscoe and Balleny. The schooner Eliza Scott, of 154 tons, commanded by Mr. John Balleny, and the dandy-rigged cutter Sabrina, of 54 tons, Mr. H. Freeman, master, sailed from the southern end of New Zealand, January 7, 1839, fitted for sealing purposes, but with Mr. Enderby's usual liberal instructions to lose no opportunity of pushing as far as possible to the south. They crossed the track of Bellinghausen on the 24th, and continued without

whom we are indebted for what we know of Balleny's voyage, to find that his anticipations of its proving useful to the success of Sir James Ross's greater expedition have been so fully borne out.

The services of Ross and his gallant companions covered a space of three years, exclusive of the passages to and from the Cape of Good Hope. During this period three distinct voyages were accomplished. Their first departure from Simon's Bay took place of the 6th of April, 1840, and pursuing a course to the northward of and nearly parallel to the 50th degree of south latitude, they reach Van Dieman's Land on the 16th of August, and after having passed two months and a half of the winter season at Kerguelen's Island. On the 12th of November, 1840, they left Hobart Town, and after some stay at the Auckland islands, finally sailed in a direct course towards those entirely unexamined regions which were the main points of their ambition. They returned to Hobart Town late in the autumn of that latitude, April 7, 1841. During this cruise was accomplished the discovery of the vast extent of mountainous continent which now bears the gracious name of Victoria; the active volcano, Mount Erebus, and the extinct one, Mount Terror; and the icy barrier, probably an outwork of continued land, which, running east and west for some hundreds of miles in the 78th degree of south latitude, prevents all approach to the pole on either side of the 180th degree of longitude. Between July and November, the vessels visited Sydney and New Zealand, remaining three months at the latter.

material impediment a southward course over the very spot where the Russian navigator in lat. 63 had been compelled by ice to alter his course to the eastward in 1820. On the 1st of February they had reached the parallel of 699 in long. 1729 east, 220 miles to the southward of the extreme point which Bellinghausen had been able to attain in this meridian. This evidence of the shifting character of the ice in this direction was the circumstance which induced Sir James Ross to select this quarter for his first attempt. Here the packed ice compelled them to work to the northwest; and on attaining the 66th degree, in long. 163° east, they discovered a group of islands, which turned out to be five in number. A landing was with much risk effected by Mr. Freeman on one of these, the summit of which, estimated to rise to the height of 12,000 feet, emitted smoke, as if to corroborate the evidence of volcanic origin furnished by the fragments of scoriæ and basalt mixed with crystals of olivine collected from the beachless base of its perpendicular cliffs. In their further progress the vessels must have passed within a short distance of Cape Clairée, a projection of the land to which M. D'Urville in the following year gave the name of Adelie, in right of his supposed discovery. On the 2d of March, in lat. 699 58', long, 121° 8', land was again discovered, which now figures on the map by the name of Sabrina. We cannot omit to mention that on this voyage a phenomenon was observed, which strikingly illustrated that transporting power of ice to which so extensive an influence has been attributed by some eminent geologists. At The second voyage commenced on the a distance of 1400 miles from the nearest 15th of November, 1841, and was pursued known land, though possibly within 300, towards the region explored in the former or even 100, miles from land which may trip, and with nearly the same success. hereafter be discovered, an iceberg was From the 18th of December to the 2d of seen with a block of rock, some twelve feet February, the ships were employed in forcin height, attached to it at nearly a hun- ing their way through pack-ice from the dred feet from the sea-line. We cannot 62d to the 68th degree of south latitude; here pursue the train of reflection and the- and when, on the 23d of February, they at ory which the appearance of this luggage-length reached the icy barrier, in long. 162° van of the ocean is calculated to suggest. Mr. Darwin on this, and other similar evidence, observes that "if one iceberg in a thousand, or ten thousand, transports its fragment, the bottom of the Antarctic sea, and the shores of its islands, must already be scattered with masses of foreign rock, the counterpart of the erratic boulders of the northern hemisphere." It must be gratifying to the writer in the Journal of the Geographical Society, vol. ix., p. 517, to

west, the season was too far advanced to admit of further attempts to find an opening. Having approached within a mile and a half of the barrier, in lat. 78° 10' south, some six miles further to the southward than the limit of their former voyage, they commenced their reluctant retreat, and not having seen land for 138 days, gained a winter anchorage in Berkeley Sound, off the Falkland Islands, on the 6th of April, 1842. The spring season of this year, between Sep

tember and December, was occupied by a cruise to Cape Horn, and back to Berkeley

Sound.

The third polar voyage was commenced on the 17th of December, 1842, in a direction nearly opposite to that of the two former years, and towards the region explored by Weddell. The difficulties and dangers encountered in this last attempt appear to have exceeded those of the two former voyages, and the lat. 71. 30', long. 15° west, formed the limit of their southward cruise. The ships gained the Cape of Good Hope on the 4th of April, 1843, within two days of three years after they had first quitted those parts.

summary

obliged to relinquish a more extended exploration of this new-discovered land; but the weakly condition of his crews imperatively demanded of him to discontinue his laborious exertions, and return feebled people, upon finding that the western part of the Côte Clairée turned away suddenly to the southward. He accordingly bore away on the 1st of February, and reached Hobart Town on the 17th of the same month, after an absence of only Côte Clairée had been seen by Balleny in the preseven weeks. Although the western point of the ceding summer, it was mistaken by him for an enormous iceberg, and the land he at first imagined he saw behind it he afterwards thought might only be clouds. These circumstances are mentioned in the log-book of the Eliza Scott, but are not inserted here with the least intention of disputing the unquestionable right of the French to the honor of this very important discovery.

to a milder climate to restore the health of his en

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in compliance with the instructions of the governThe result of the American expedition was, ment, kept profoundly secret on their return to Sydney, and nothing appeared in the local papers respecting their extensive operations but uncertain conjectures and contradictory statements. I felt, therefore, the more indebted to the kind and gene

We do not profess in the above to have enumerated all the commanders who, between the period of Cook's expedition and the year 1840, had attained high southern latitudes in various directions, or even made discoveries of land. We believe, however, that from it our readers may derive a correct general notion of the condition and progress of Antarctic disco-rous consideration of Lieutenant Wilkes, the disvery down to the period when the French and American expeditions, under D'Urville and Wilkes, gained, nearly simultaneously, some ten months' start of Ross in these seas. The result of these expeditions, so far as concerns our present subject, may best be given in the following passages from Sir James Ross's work:

"The most interesting news that awaited us on our arrival at Van Dieman's Land [August, 1840], related to the discoveries made, during the last summer, in the southern regions by the French expedition, consisting of the Astrolabe and Zelée, under the command of Captain Dumont D'Urville, and by the United States expedition under Lieutenant Charles Wilkes, in the frigate Vincennes.

tinguished commander of the expedition, for a long letter on various subjects, which his experience had suggested as likely to prove serviceable to me, under the impression that I should still attempt to penetrate to the southward on some of the meridians he had visited; a tracing of his original chart accompanied his letter, showing the great those parts of the coast which he thought we extent of his discoveries, and pointing out to me should find most easily accessible. These documents would indeed have proved of infinite value to me had I felt myself compelled to follow the strict letter of my instructions; and I do not the less appreciate the motives which prompted the communication of those papers because they did not eventually prove so useful to me as the American commander had hoped and expected; and I avail myself of this opportunity of publicly expressing the deep sense of thankfulness I feel to him for his friendly and highly honorable conduct.

"The accounts published, by the authority of Captain D'Urville, in the local papers, stated, that the French ships sailed from Hobart Town on the "The arduous and persevering exertions of this 1st of January, 1840, and discovered land on the expedition, continued throughout a period of more evening of the 19th; and, on the 21st, some of the than six weeks, under circumstances of great officers landed upon a small islet lying some dis- peril and hardship, cannot fail to reflect the highest tance from the mainland, and procured some speci-credit on those engaged in the enterprise, and exmens of its granitic rock. D'Urville traced the land cite the admiration of all who are in the smallest in a continuous line one hundred and fifty miles, degree acquainted with the laborious and difficult between the longitudes of 136° and 140° east, in nature of an icy navigation; but I am grieved to about the latitude of the Antarctic circle. It was be obliged ta add, that, at the present time, they do entirely covered with snow, and there was not the not seem to have received either the approbation least appearance of vegetation: its general height or reward their spirited exertions merit. The narwas estimated at about one thousand three hun-rative of their comprehensive labors is now in the dred feet. M. D'Urville named it Terre Adélie. hands of the public; I need, therefore, make no Proceeding to the westward, they discovered and further remark here on the subject. sailed about sixty miles along a solid wall of ice, "That the commanders of each of these great one hundred and fifty feet high, which he, believ-national undertakings should have selected the ing to be a covering or crust of a more solid base, very place for penetrating to the southward, for named Côte Clairée. It must have been extremely the exploration of which they were well aware at painful to the enterprising spirit of D'Urville to be the time that the expedition under my command

have caused them rather to have chosen any other

ever,

was expressly preparing, and thereby forestalling | such a work. To Captain Wilkes we must our purposes, did certainly greatly surprise me. also acknowledge our obligations for many I should have expected their national pride would agreeable hours of pleasant reading, which path in the wide field before them, than one thus have left upon us a strong impression of the pointed out, if no higher consideration had power professional merits of the author and his to prevent such an interference. They had, how-gallant associates. the unquestionable right to select any point they thought proper, at which to direct their efforts, without considering the embarrassing situation in which their conduct might have placed me. Fortunately, in my instructions, much had been left to my judgment under unforeseen circumstances; and, impressed with the feeling that England had ever led the way of discovery in the southern as well as in the northern regions, I considered it would have been inconsistent with the pre-eminence she has ever maintained, if we were to follow in the footsteps of the expedition of any other nation. I therefore resolved at once to avoid all interference with their discoveries, and select a much more easterly meridian [170° E.], on which, to endeavor to penetrate to the southward, and, if possible, reach the magnetic pole.

"My chief reason for choosing this particular meridian, in preference to any other, was its being that upon which Balleny had, in the summer of 1839, attained to the latitude of 690, and there found an open sea; and not, as has been asserted, that I was deterred from any apprehension of an equally unsuccessful issue to any attempt we might make where the Americans and French had so signally failed to get beyond even the 67° of latitude. For I was well aware how ill-adapted their ships were for as ervice of that nature, from not being fortified to withstand the shocks and pressure they must have been necessarily exposed to, had they ventured to penetrate any extensive body of ice. They would have equally failed had they tried it upon the meridian I had now chosen, for it will be seen we met with a broad belt of ice, upwards of two hundred miles across, which it would have been immediate destruction to them to have encountered; but which, in our fortified vessels, we could confidently run into, and push our way through into the open sea beyond. Without such means it would be utterly impossible for any one, under such circumstances, however bold or persevering, to attain a high southern latitude." Vol. i., pp. 113-118.

We are, moreover, bound to say, on the evidence which he does not scruple to furnish, that we consider the merits of his exploits much enhanced by the circumstance that the naval departments of his country appear to have acted with negligence, at the least, towards the brave men whom it sent on the service Between the officers and men in question. of the United States and England, respectively, we are as incompetent as we should be reluctant to draw any comparison which should strike a balance in favor of either. We rest satisfied with the general conviction that there is no service, warlike or scientific, which they will not be found qualified and zealous to discharge to the extreme limit of human ability. We cannot, however, but entertain, on the evidence of Captain Wilkes' own pages, a complacent conviction that, however rivalled by our Anglo-Saxon relations in blue water, we as yet manage matters better in the dockyard. If, with respect to an isolated occurrence in this instance, a controversy has risen in which the evidence appears to us conclusive in favor of Sir J. Ross, we are less inclined to leave unnoticed the fact that the American ships appear to have been not only insufficiently strengthened for this Polar navigation-which in their case, as in that of Captain Cook, formed but an episode of their instructions, but ill-found for an extensive voyage of discovery in any direc

tion.

It was on the 11th of January, 1841, and in that 71st degree of south latitude which formed the limit of Cook's southward course, that the first distinct vision was obtained by Ross's expedition of the vast volAny detailed notice of the published canic continent which bars access to the voyages of the two able and distinguished southern magnetic pole, and probably to navigators with whom the pursuit of a com- the pole of the earth. Appearances of mon object brought Captain Ross into a land there had been some days earlier, sufgenerous and peaceful ri. alry, is beside our ficiently plausible to have deterred less expresent purpose. We must pay, however, perienced navigators, and perhaps to have our tribute of admiration to the skill of left spurious traces on maps which might French artists and the liberality of French have waited long for correction. On this Government patronage, as illustrated in day, however, Mount Sabine rose conspicuthe splendid atlas of D'Urville. Nor can ous in the view, attaining, as was afterwe omit to lament the dreadful and un-wards ascertained, the height of nearly timely death, by the catastrophe on the Versailles railroad, of the man whose genius and enterprise furnished the materiale for

10,000 feet, at a distance of some thirty miles from the coast. A long range of mountains of scarcely less elevation was

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