HISTORY OF DISCOVERY. 87 



laden with fragments of rock and stone rubbish. On the 

 23rd the two vessels came in sight of each other, also 

 on the 27th, but from this date forwards the Porpoise 

 hastened . on to the west in advance of the Vincennes. 

 Of the two other ships, the Peacock had an accident on 

 the 23rd of January, in latitude 65° 55' S. and longitude 

 1 51° 19' E., her rudder being injured by the thick ice. 

 In consequence of this she was partly unable to obey 

 the helm, and consequently came into collision with an 

 iceberg, so that she was compelled to leave the polar 

 seas without delay and make for Sydney, which was 

 reached on the 17th of February. Pinkney, in the 

 Flying Fish, had first seen icebergs on the 18th of 

 January; on the 21st he had reached the edge of the 

 pack-ice, in latitude 65° 20' S. and longitude 159° 36' E., 

 and then steered to the west, keeping, on the whole, to 

 the north of the other ships. On the 23rd he, too, saw 

 the land elevations observed by the others ; but for the 

 rest saw no land whatever, not even by Peacock Bay, 

 which he approached pretty closely on the 30th of Janu- 

 ary. This is accounted for by a violent snowstorm 

 which raged from the south-east on that date. As far 

 as longitude 143° E. he held to the edge of the pack-ice ; 

 then, however, he steered again to the north, and returned 

 to Sydney by New Zealand. 



The other two ships meantime pursued their ardu- 

 ous course with undiminished spirit. On the 30th of 

 January Wilkes again saw land. He succeeded in 

 breaking through the field-ice in a narrow channel and 

 in reaching the open water, on which he approached the 

 dark cliffs of Adelie Land, within half a mile of the very 

 point where its first discoverer found the outlying coast 

 islets. According to Wilkes' estimate the land here 

 extended east and west to a distance of fully sixty 

 nautical miles from his position in latitude 66° 45' S. 

 and longitude 140° 3' E. Wilkes here gave the whole 



