108 THE ANTARCTIC. 



was rapidly thickening- again and the belt of broken frag- 

 ments of pack and icebergs was closely cemented together 

 in an impenetrable mass at the foot of the ice barrier. In 

 the course of the 23rd they were within one and a half 

 nautical miles from the face of the barrier, surrounded by 

 icebergs and heavy pieces of ice covered with stones, 

 raising the hope that land would soon be seen. The 

 ice barrier itself was here distinctly different in appear- 

 ance from that observed the previous year farther west. 

 Its outlines were more broken and full of indentations, 

 the elevation, too, was different from that previously 

 noted. It was found that the height was here only 105 

 feet above the sea, and this decreased towards the east 

 to eighty feet, though it rose again farther east. The 

 southernmost point reached by the vessels, a point that 

 has remained the highest southern point of the earth 

 attained to this day, was latitude j8° io' S. and longitude 

 161° 2j' W., while the face of the ice cliff lay one minute 

 further south. 



Ross attempted to penetrate along the barrier to the 

 eastward, and had the satisfaction of getting a view of 

 the surface when he came to the lower part of the face. 

 It was seen that it gradually rose to the south till it 

 presented the appearance of lofty snow-covered mountain 

 ranges. Although Ross and his companions were fully 

 persuaded that they saw elevated land, he put it down 

 only as " an appearance of land," lest some subsequent 

 navigator should prove him to have been mistaken. 

 From this point, however, all further progress to the east 

 of the barrier had to be relinquished, for it here diverged 

 to the north-east and the main pack pressed against it, 

 and an immediate return was decided upon, especially as 

 the winter was already setting in, with great severity at 

 these high latitudes. Ross therefore sailed back north- 

 wards, and it was soon evident that the south-western edge 

 of the pack-ice was still extending from south-east to 



