316 NOTES ON THE BOTANY 
agers to steer to the southward, through openings in the ice, 
with a strong tide or current, and in the evening they descried 
a most singular crater-shaped, conical island, to the south- 
west, backed by what appeared to be other low islands, all 
quite bare of snow, and these again, surmounted by many 
mountains of considerable elevation and tabular form, covered 
with snow and ice. What seemed separate islands, however, 
proved a continued land; and as it was thus impossible to 
be penetrated, the ships lay-to, among very thick ice; and 
to their disappointment, were wafted northward, along with 
the surrounding bergs, by a tide (?) which required all their 
efforts to resist, and to maintain their position. 
New Year’s Day was also fair; the ships were then in lat. 
64° 14’, long. 55° 54/, and lying off the above-described land, 
which forms a deep bight, in which is situated the small 
conical island. The coast trends from South to E.N.E., and 
ends in a bluff point, covered with little extinct craters, and 
bare of snow. Many stupendous icebergs, of a tabular form, 
and from 2 to 5 miles long, formed a kind of chain from the 
point of land, all aground, and doubtless retaining the Pack in 
its place, like so many firmly-fixed piles. On the 2nd of Ja- 
nuary, the Pack closed upon the ships, which were accordingly 
made fast to a large piece of ice, with the view of preventing 
pressure and keeping them from drifting too far. The Floes 
were large, and much more like hummocks in their character 
than is general, appearing as if they had been broken up and 
consolidated again, full of holes, and covered with soft trea- 
cherous snow. Many birds were hovering about the ice, and 
among them, a few King Penguins, weighing 60-70 pounds, 
with Hawk-Gulls, White Petrel, and four or five other species 
of Petrel. A heavy northerly gale came on the next day, 
accompanied with mist and snow, and the ships cast off 
from the floe and got into a little pool of water, in which 
they beat about among ice, their object being to gain the 
bight, and the small crater-shaped island, which they were 
enabled to do on the 6th, when the weather again became 
clear, and the sun, to their great delight, shone forth. The 
