EXPLORING ANTARCTIC SEAS 



whether the name, Wilkes Land, is to be given to all 

 this coast or to the restricted area (in 134° E.) mapped 

 on Mawson's expedition and by him named Wilkes 

 Land, it is difficult to decide. Even Balch in his 

 lengthy discussion of the point is unable to say who 

 first used the term ''Wilkes Land" in the larger sense, 

 though he notes that it appears in Stieler's Atlas pub- 

 lished in Germany in 1866. 



The discovery of the North Magnetic Pole in 183 1 

 by John Ross and James Ross greatly enhanced the 

 interest of scientists and laymen in earth magnetism. 

 It was fitting that the official British expedition fitted 

 out in 1838 and 1839 to investigate the magnetic field 

 in the Southern Hemisphere should be under the leader- 

 ship of Captain James Ross, who had studied mag- 

 netism under Sabine. Hooker, one of the famous trio 

 of Victorian scientists (Hooker, Darwin, and Huxley), 

 accompanied Ross as surgeon and botanist. Ross 

 was directed to establish magnetic observatories at 

 Kerguelen and Hobart and then he was to sail south- 

 ward and try to reach the South Magnetic Pole. When 

 Ross arrived in Australia, he found that D'Urville and 

 Wilkes had both made discoveries in the region which 

 he proposed to explore. He therefore boldly decided 

 to cruise farther east than their tracks, and to try to 

 penetrate the pack ice where Balleny had reported open 

 water in 1839 (see Figure 5). 



Early in January, 1841, he reached the pack ice and 

 his stout bomb-ships readily traversed it, for the first 

 time in history, in about nine days. The magnetic 

 needle was dipping at 85°, so that the Magnetic Pole 



29 



