AUTHOR'S PREFACE. 



When I was honoured with the inquiry whether I 

 should feel disposed to undertake the preparation of 

 the volume on The Antarctic Regions, some doubts and 

 difficulties lay in the way of an immediate affirmative 

 response. The gravity of the task, especially in the 

 light of the very short time accorded to it, was from the 

 first obvious, and all the more so because I had not the 

 actual and personal acquaintance with the regions to be 

 described that is exacted by the conditions under which 

 such a work should, ideally, be undertaken. This draw- 

 back, it must be acknowledged, has relatively diminished 

 in importance since the recent death of Captain Dallmann, 

 for no one now in Germany has with his own eyes beheld 

 the Antarctic world, and so far as adequate compensation 

 for such drawback can be made, it has been secured by 

 drawing everywhere and in the forefront upon all available 

 sources in their complete and original form — a list of the 

 more important of which will be found in the Appendix 

 to this volume. 



Another and a supreme difficulty, in the way of a 

 satisfactory account of the Antarctic regions, is the re- 

 markably scanty information that was collected during 

 certain few voyages of exploration that spread over more 

 than ioo years. The unavoidable gaps, however, drive 

 home one important fact — the absolute necessity, in the 

 cause of science, of voyages of Antarctic exploration. 

 For this reason the history of voyages of discovery 

 occupies a space that in any description of another 

 geographical area would rightly be regarded as ex- 

 cessive. It would, however, be quite impossible to 



