OF THE ANTARCTIC VOYAGE. 321 
of the night, forbidding any progress during those hours of ob- 
scurity, rendered it impracticable to enter the Pack-ice, even 
had it been slack enough for them to do so; and the Captain 
had, therefore, no choice but to follow the edge of the Pack, 
keeping, if possible, to the southward of the French track, 
and wherever an opening might present itself, he intended 
to attempt following it in the direction of the Pole. 
Until the 22nd, the Pack was accordingly traced, but on 
the next day, the ships lost sight of it; and glad to be mak- 
ing any way to the south, they joyfully began running S.E. 
in clear water, with bergs only, and no Pack-ice in view. 
For, though the rapidly lengthening nights, and the absolute 
necessity of risking navigation in the dark, if any progress at 
all was to be made, were enough to daunt the courage of 
those who knew something of the dangers which beset these 
dreary seas, yet such was the reluctance of Captain 
Ross and his officers to give up before accomplishing all 
they wished, that, even at this late season of the year, 
they persevered in pushing onwards. On the 28th of Feb- 
ruary they re-crossed the Antarctic Circle, after having 
experienced another month of most unfavourable weather; 
for, except one day, it had snowed more or less through- 
out the month of February, and the sky was constantly 
obscured with clouds. The temperature, during this high 
summer of the South Polar climes, varied between 27° and 
359. When the wind blew from the north, coming over the 
warmer ocean, it invariably brought a thick and foggy atmos- 
phere, the warmer vapours being condensed by the colder pea 
in this latitude. To this weather the Antarctic Regions are 
always subject. No great extreme of cold is experienced 
during summer, and still less any heat, either in the air or 
the sun’s rays, intercepted, as these latter constantly are, by 
the fogs. The weather is never genial, and the moon and stars 
rarely, if ever, appear at night, when darkness comes on : pro- 
bably no climate can be more uncongenial to vegetable life, or 
to what may be termed the enjoyment of human existence either. 
To add to these discomforts, once a week on an average, 
