Travees. — Presidential Address. 113 



to land twice in positions from which, had he possessed the 

 appHances ordinarily used in arctic explorations, he might 

 have made excursions over the glaciers that he saw flowing 

 amongst still active volcanos, sufficiently indicates that no 

 greater difficulty will in all probability be found in penetrat- 

 ing inland than has usually been experienced in exploring 

 many parts of the arctic land areas. It will be remembered, 

 too, that the Swedish whale-ship "Antarctic" recently visited 

 the coast of Victoria Land in search of whales, following 

 Ross's track to the vicinity of Mount Erebus, thus success- 

 fully fighting its way through the ice-pack to the ice-free sea 

 of Ross. From thence she returned to the northward ; and 

 it is important to note that the return voyage through the 

 pack-ice, made, it is true, in the latter part of summer, oc- 

 cupied only six days, as against the thirty-eight days which 

 were required for the southward course in the earlier part of 

 the season, the pack during her return through it having been 

 found to be loose and easily penetrated. It was in this ship 

 that Mr. Borchgrevink (a Swedish naturalist) obtained a 

 passage under circumstances which have appeared, in some 

 detail, in the Victorian newspapers, and he has told us that 

 no difficulty was found in landing, first on Possession Island, 

 on which Ross had raised the British flag upwards of fifty 

 years before, and next at Cape Adare, on the mainland. 

 Those who have read Mr. Borchgrevink's narrative of this 

 adventure will remember his expressions of delight at having 

 gathered a lichen, which he assumed to have been the first 

 specimen of terrestrial vegetable life that had ever been dis- 

 covered on the antarctic continent, and those of his regret at 

 his having been unable to extend his researches, owing to the 

 fact that the ship was engaged in a commercial adventure 

 only. 



These later accounts have led practical navigators and ex- 

 plorers to conclude that, with such bases of operation as are 

 afforded by the eastern colonies of Australia and by New 

 Zealand, those who are enterprising enough to engage in the 

 arduous work of antarctic exj^loration will be able, as suc- 

 cessfully as our great arctic explorers have done, to overcome 

 all obstacles, and to hope that their labours will be accom- 

 plished without having to deplore any serious loss of life. 



But it is not merely in the domain of ordinary geographical 

 knowledge that the world would gain by persistent and scien- 

 tific explorations of these regions. The wonderful results 

 obtained by the "Challenger" staff have demonstrated how 

 much may be done to extend our knowledge in many im- 

 portant branches of science by well-conducted researches even 

 in regions which lie within the limits of ordinary traffic and 

 observation. How much more, then, may be expected from 



