282 ROSS' VOYAGE OF EXPLORATION. [1840. 



with perennial snow, destitute of vegetation, and averaging 

 about thirteen hundred feet in general height. The name of 

 Terre Adelie was now given to it by the French commander, 

 and he continued his way to the west. In a few days he dis- 

 covered, and sailed for about sixty miles along, a solid wall of 

 ice one hundred and fifty feet high — probably near the Piner's 

 Bay of Captain Wilkes — which he believed to be the crust or 

 covering of a solid body of land, and named Cote Clairee. 

 The discovery was soon after made that the line of coast 

 trended to the southward, and as his crews were in an en- 

 feebled condition, and the vessels, which, like those of the 

 American expedition, were illy adapted for such service, had 

 suffered considerable damage, Admiral d'Urville issued orders 

 on the 1st of February to bear away for the north, and on the 

 17th of the month he once more anchored in the Derwent. 

 Having repaired his vessels he set sail for France, where he 

 arrived in safety, having performed, as it eventually proved, 

 his last voyage. The magnetic observations of the French 

 vessels corresponded very nearly with those of the American 

 squadron, and indicated that the magnetic pole was not far 

 from Terre Adelie. 



(4.) But. by far the most important, and the greatest amount 

 of information in regard to the Antarctic Continent, was ob- 

 tained by Captain Sir James Clark Ross, of the British navy, 

 and the discoverer of the northern magnetic pole, in three 

 successive voyages, made between the years 1840 and 1843. 

 The principal objects had in view in fitting out his expedition 

 were the improvement of the science of magnetism, and the 

 determination of the position of the southern magnetic pole. 

 He left England with two vessels, the Erebus and Terror, in 

 September 1839, and arrived at Hobarton on the 16th of Au- 

 gust, 1840. Unlike those of the French and Americans, his 

 vessels were amply provided with suitable stores and neces- 

 saries, and so strongly fortified to penetrate the ice, that heat 

 one time forced them through a thick belt two hundred miles 

 across, which would have completely destroyed any other 

 craft, into the open sea beyond. 



