no TASMANIA AND THE ANTARCTIC 



and seen many wonders hitherto quite unexpected, though 

 it has been very unprohfic. We reached 78° 3' S. Latitude 

 and approached as near to the S. Magnetic Pole as was 

 possible, within 150 miles, having laid down its position 

 with perfect accuracy from observations made to the N.W. 

 and S.W. of its position. We have run along and roughly 

 surveyed an enormous tract of land extending from 72° 

 to 79° S. Latitude ; every part of it further south than 

 any hitherto discovered land, and our progress was finally 

 arrested by a stupendous barrier of ice running 300 miles 

 E. and W. I shall, however, give you a list of our positions 

 every day at noon since leaving V.D. Land, last, that Maria 

 may lay it down in your S. Polar chart and I shall add a 

 small chart of the coast we have seen. (P.S. I have too much 

 to say to leave room.) 



And now as regards the object of the expedition, it is 

 certainly a failure, our intention having been to have made 

 observations on the actual site of the S. Magnetic Pole, and 

 also to have wintered within the Antarctic Circle, that we 

 might have made a series of experiments with such instru- 

 ments as must be used on land — from the first object we 

 were deterred by the Pole's lying inland, among a stupendous 

 range of mountains covered from their tops to the sea beach 

 with everlasting snow and ice. Nor can we anywhere 

 approach the mainland as the sea is covered with streams 

 of ice and sometimes extending in one continued line for 

 many miles. In approaching such a coast the danger 

 arises from the chances of a shift of wind, or a gale w^hich 

 would prevent our working off, when all the ice would set 

 down on us and jam us ; or, what is quite as bad, we might 

 be becalmed and frozen in, for the sun here has no power 

 to melt the ice even in the height of summer ; wintering 

 in such a Latitude Captain Eoss pronounced as totally 

 impracticable, as we should be frozen in, and only get out 

 when a current should take the pack, which w^ould imbed 

 us, north, and melt it in warmer water.^ 



1 As he further explains to his father (Nov. 25, 1842) who had been told 

 by the Admiralty that they were then to winter in the ice, perhaps in ord^ 

 to keep some term days in the South Shetlands : — ' We cannot remain in the 

 pack except imder sail, for the S.W. wind would gradually blow us out of it, 

 . . . and it is idle to suppose that an accessible harbour could be found where 

 the ice and snow are perennial. There is no great winter cold to shut us in 

 safely, in a few days, or summer's heat to thaw it.' 



