154 president's address. 



(2) Granite and various ancient crystalline rocks have been 



proved to occur in sit a at the South Slietlands and 

 Trinity Land, and granite and gneiss occur in situ, 

 forming nine small islands off Terre Adelie, as observed 

 by the French corvettes Z' Astrolabe and La Zehe/^ 

 Drift fragments of granite, dioritic rocks, quartzites, 

 clay shales, itc, were dredged by the Challenger not 

 far from the supposed Termination Land of Wilkes. 

 Ross dredged a large piece of coarse granite off Victoria 

 Land, and Dr. McCormick, the surgeon of the Erehus, 

 frequently found fragments of granite in the crops of the 

 penguins. His researches constantly proved that the 

 penguins were invaluable as collectors of geological 

 specimens. Granite is almost always characteristic of 

 continents or of islands bordering continents, but is 

 usually absent from oceanic islands. 



(3) Glauconite in the blue muds near the Antarctic barrier 



is probably indicative of the proximity of a continent. 



(4) Commenting on the fact that the observations during the 



Challenger expedition showed that 162 new species out 

 of 398 identified are peculiar to Antarctic regions. Dr. 

 Murray states (oj?. cit. p. 22), "It is most probal^le, indeed 

 almost certain, that the floor of the ocean, as well as all 

 pelagic waters, have been peopled from the shallow waters 

 surrounding continental land, and here in the deep 

 waters of the Antarctic we appear to have very clear 

 indications of the existence of the descendants of animals 

 that once inhabited the shallow water along the shores 

 of Antarctica, while in the other regions of the ocean 

 the descendants of the shallow water organisms of the 

 northern continents prevail." 



* Voyage au Pole Sad et dans 1' Oceanie. Sur les Corvettes L' Astrolabe 

 et La Z6l^e, ex6cut^ pendant les Annies 18.37-40. Geologic, Min^ralogie, 

 et Geographie physique du Voyage, Vols, xxii.-xxiii. Paris, 1848. 



