326 POLAR PROBLEMS 



played by aircraft in the polar exploration of the immediate future. 

 Until they are employed there is little likelihood that the blank white 

 spaces of the map which indicate pack-infested seas and the hypothet- 

 ical coast lines which are dotted across them will be filled in or sketched 

 in accurately, as is essential before we can claim anything but a 

 very approximate knowledge of the continent. 



Meanwhile, for parties whose resources are not equal to the attack 

 upon a major problem such as this, there is much useful work which 

 can be carried out at less expense and with far less material, money, 

 and personnel. 



The more sections that can be made through the coastal ranges, 

 the more chance there will be of making broad generalizations which 

 are likely to hold good. The importance of the collection of paleo- 

 climatological evidence cannot be too much emphasized. The loca- 

 tion, in situ, of the formations whose presence has already been 

 indicated by erratic blocks, is of the utmost importance, since without 

 this knowledge the relations of these rocks to others already examined 

 in place cannot even be guessed. Further collection from spots which 

 have already yielded the evidence on which our knowledge of Ant- 

 arctic paleontology is based is wanted and will probably be more pro- 

 ductive in the immediate future than the search for fossils in regions 

 elsewhere, though this also is essential if progress is to be made. The 

 steep walls of the Antarctic glacier valleys, completely bare of vegeta- 

 tion as they are, are ideal hunting grounds for the geologist, and in 

 Antarctica under present conditions the more mountainous the country 

 the greater the results he is likely to obtain. Among historical local- 

 ities which need immediate attention, the Beardmore Glacier region, 

 the Terra Nova and Wood Bays area (on the South Victoria Land 

 coast in 75° S.), and Graham Land, generally, would well repay further 

 detailed investigation. In the first-mentioned area are centered some 

 of the most intriguing of all problems. It has been traversed by four 

 sledge units, not a single one of which included a geologist or was able 

 to spare more than a few hours for geological investigation. With 

 an airplane available to concentrate men and stores on the Barrier 

 immediately to the north, both sides of Beardmore Glacier might be 

 roughly surveyed in a single season and priceless material collected. 

 Parties could work across the horst farther to the north by way of the 

 various outlet glaciers which intersect it, and in a comparatively 

 short time the main outstanding problems of the Australian Quadrant 

 might be solved. The geology of the less accessible portions of the coast 

 is likely to remain obscure for longer periods, though systematic 

 echo sounding and further dredging on a large scale might add con- 

 siderablv to the available evidence. 



