BE PORT ON THE FIELD-GEOLOGY 
OF THE REGION EXPLORED DURING THE 
‘DISCOVERY’ ANTARCTIC EXPEDITION, 1901-4. 
By II. T. Ferrar, M.A., F.G.S., Geologist to the Expedition. 
Chapter I. 
ISLANDS, CHIEFLY OFF THE COAST OF SOUTH VICTOPJA LAND. 
The part of South Victoria Land known to us consists of a great range, or series 
of mountain-ranges, stretching in an almost straight line from latitude 71° S. to 
lat. 82° S., a distance of about 800 miles. Some of the mountains rise to a height 
of 13,000 feet, and it is remarkable that there is no extensive area of land lower 
than 4000 feet. Off this bold coast-line is a shallow sea (Ross Sea), with occasional 
islands arranged along a line roughly parallel to the coast and close in under it. 
The earliest specimens brought back from the Ross Quadrant were those obtained 
by Captain Balleny in the year 1839 from the Balleny Islands. Shortly afterwards 
the ‘ Erebus ’ and ‘ Terror ’ Expedition under Sir James Clarke Ross brought back rock- 
specimens from other outlying islands, and until the year 1895 no additional specimens 
of Antarctic rocks were obtained from this area. It was also known that (l) the 
Balleny Islands are volcanic, one of them possessing an active volcano ; (2) South 
Victoria Land consists of a great range of mountains probably volcanic,* and with at 
least one volcano still active. The specimens include scoriae and olivine-basalt from 
Young Island, one of the Balleny group, f basalts, palagonite-tuffs, and granites 
from the largest of the Possession Islands, and basalt from Franklin Island, one 
of the isolated islands off the coast, j 
A French expedition contemporary with that of Ross also obtained granites § from 
* Ross, ‘ Voyage in the Southern and Antarctic Regions, 1839-43,’ 1847, vol. ii, p. 415. 
t 1 The Antarctic Manual’ (Roy. Geogr. Soe.), 1901, p. 341. 
t Prior, Mineralogical Magazine, 1899, vol. xii, p. 91. 
§ ‘ The Antarctic Manual ’ (Roy. Geogr. Soc.), 1901, p. 449. 
VOL. i. 
B 
