90 



DISCOVERY 



story. In 1886 the barque Cingalese was close to the 

 island for three days. Her captain described it as 

 si.\ miles long, rising to 300 feet in the north-east, 

 ragged at the south-west, and devoid of snow or vegeta- 

 tion. In 1890 he saw it again. In spite of these 

 circumstantial accounts all recent attempts to find an 

 island in that locahty have failed. In 1894 the s.s. 

 Rimntaka searched in vain along the parallel of lat. 

 59° 24' S. for 144 miles, and the same vessel tried 

 again on other occasions, but with no success. Captain 

 R. F. Scott in 1904 found a depth of 2,318 fathoms on 

 the site of the island ' ; Davis in 1909 searched in vain 

 for land ^ ; and the Carnegie in 1915 could not find" it.' 

 The late Sir E. H. Shackleton had intended to search 



THE LANDING PI.ACE ON THE COAST OF GOUGH 



ISLAND. THE SCOTIA IN THE DISTANCE. 



Photo by U'. 5. Bruce. 



once more for this elusive island on the present voj-age 

 of the Quest. 



That an island can elude the explorer to such an 

 extent that doubt is cast on its existence is shown in 

 the case of Bouvet Island. In 1739 the French Captain 

 Bouvet, searching for new southern lands with which to 

 trade, sighted land in lat. 54° S., long. 4° 30' E. Pack- 

 ice prevented a nearer approach than twelve to fifteen 

 miles, but Bouvet described his discovery as high 

 snow-covered land, extending E.N.E. from a lofty 

 headland for some twentj'-four to thirty miles. The 



1 Voyage of the "Discovery.' R. F. Scott. London, 1905, 

 ii, p. 401. 



2 " Voyage of S.Y. Ninirod." J. K. Davis, Geographical 

 Journal, December 1910. 



' According to the Geographical Journal (February 1921). 

 Captain Dixon, of the s.s. Canadian Navigator, in 1918 failed 

 to find either the Ninirod Islands or Dougherty Island, although 

 he was favoured by conditions of good visibility during his 

 search. A marked increase in the number of birds and some 

 kelp were observed to the west-south-west of the supposed 

 position of the Nimrod Islands. These may possibly be indica- 

 tions of land in that direction. 



coast appeared to be steep. Believing that he had 

 found the long-sought southern continent, Bouvet 

 named his discovery Cap de la Circoncision. His 

 second ship gave a slightly different position, and held 

 that the land was an island. Captain James Cook in 

 1774 could not find Bouvet 's land, which remained a 

 half-credited myth till 1808, when Lindsay, a sealer, 

 discovered an island the middle of which he placed in 

 lat. 54° 22' S., long. 4° 15' E. He described it as some 

 fifteen miles long, high in the west and low in the east, 

 mainly snow-covered, but bearing some trees or 

 shrubs. Ice prevented a close approach. This was 

 clearly Bouvet 's land, but an island and not part of a 

 continent. A few years later, in 1S25, another sealer 

 named Norris reached the island, and finding it free 

 of ice, made a closer examination. In lat. 54° 15' S., 

 long. 5° E., he found a high snow-clad island, fringed by 

 a steep coast. In ignorance of Bouvet 's discovery of 

 nearly a century earlier, Norris named this Liverpool 

 Island. On account of bad weather, he did not attempt 

 to land. But now comes the curious part of his story. 

 A few days later he sighted another island, forty-five 

 miles to the north-east, which he named Thompson 

 Island. He described this island as bearing " evident 

 marks of having been a volcano, as it is nothing less 

 than a complete cinder. ..." His boats were sent 

 round the island in search of seals. They were weather- 

 bound for six days on the island, and a landing was 

 made on the south-west, which appeared to be the only 

 possible place. A further discovery by Norris was a 

 group of three isolated rocks, the Chimneys, five miles 

 south-west of Thompson Island. It is difficult to 

 discredit this story of Norris's, but his second island 

 has remained hidden to this day. Ross could not find 

 Bouvet Island in 1843, on his return from the Antarctic 

 with the Erebus and the Terror, but that was not sur- 

 prising, since he, like Cook, looked too far to the east. 

 It was not until 1898 that it was rediscovered, this time 

 by the German exploring vessel Valdivia, which 

 searched for and found Bouvet Island, not in the posi- 

 tion assigned to it, but some miles farther west, viz., 

 in lat. 54° 26' S., long. 3° 24' E. Captain Krech found 

 it steep and inaccessible, rising to a height of over 

 3,000 feet, and not more than five miles across at its 

 widest part. A photograph shows it to be covered 

 with a snow or ice cap. The Valdivia could find no 

 other island in the vicinity. Since then there is no 

 report of the island being sighted, and it must still be 

 regarded as uncertain whether a second island exists. 

 Probably the Quest will throw light on the problem. 

 From what is known of the submarine relief of this 

 part of the ocean, there is nothing improbable in the 

 occurrence of a group of islands in the neighbourhood. 

 A submarine ridge with water under 2,000 fathoms in 

 depth seems to cover this part of the Southern Ocean. 



