THE NATUKE OF THE BARKIER 127 



and the Falklands, between 2000 and 3000 miles away, were 

 reached on April 6, 1842, *the first land of any description 

 that has greeted our eyes now for 135 days,' the more grateful 

 because here at length they were told ' that our late success (the 

 first visit to the ice) caused an immense sensation of triumph 

 in England ! These are the first flattering words we have 

 received from home ; nor can you conceive how welcome is 

 the news, having penetrated beyond even our former Ultima 

 Thule of Latitude.' 



His own views as to the nature of the Barrier, and of the 

 pack ice of the Antarctic, especially as bearing on the pros- 

 pects of the third voyage to the South, appear in a letter to 

 his father, dated November 25, 1842. 



All the Ice in the Antarctic Ocean is formed by the 

 gradual accumulation of Snow, on small pieces of Ice which 

 only dissolve by being drifted to warmer latitudes. The 

 Icebergs are probably the accumulation of centuries. These 

 bergs are stranded all along the coast. The Barrier is 

 probably only a large solid pack filling up a broad shallow 

 bight, like that of Benin or S. Australia. Some unusual 

 severe winter, ages ago, first filled it with a sheet of Ice, and 

 as the snow fell it sunk deeper and deeper every year till 

 it stranded ; the sun has no power on it now, and so every 

 snow shower must add to its height. What atmospheric 

 changes the revolutions of centuries may produce we cannot 

 know ; but whilst the climate of the South is so equable 

 and the removal of the ice by drifting probably proportioned 

 to its slow drifting accumulation to the South of the Packs, 

 these vast phenomena must remain comparatively un- 

 changed. The Barrier, the bergs several hundred feet high 

 and 1-6 miles long, and the Mts. of the great Antarctic 

 continent, are too grand to be imagined, and almost 

 too stupendous to be carried in the memory. With regard 

 to the prospects of this coming cruise, I am anything but 

 sanguine of great success. The past winter has been a very 

 bad one indeed, and further we know that though the sea 

 was clear of ice when Weddell went down, there was ice 

 when the two French and the Yankee expeditions attempted 

 this Longitude ; whether they tried to get through it boldly 



