12 AUSTEALASIA. 



as a god, but soon after murdered under circumstances that have never been 

 satisfactorily explained. 



Cook's researches had the effect of once for all exploding the theoretic fancy- 

 that on the surface of the globe the dry land should occupy exactly the same space 

 as the oceanic basins. Since the time of Hipparchus the most eminent geo- 

 graphers accepted as an established dogma the perfect equilibrium between land 

 and water ; and it was under the influence of this idea that Ptolemy had traced 

 across the southern part of the Indian Ocean a continental coastline connecting 

 Africa with India. This shadowy seaboard, continually receding from the eager 

 eye of navigators, was successively identified by them Avith New Guinea, New 

 Holland, and New Zealand; and later, every island sighted in more southern 

 latitudes was supposed to be some headland of the long-sought-for continent. 



Cook, who himself firmly believed in the existence of this Austral world, placed 

 its shores far to the south of the waters reached by his predecessors ; but in any 

 case we now know that the Antarctic continent, or insular group, must be of 

 slight extent compared with the boundless waste of circumpolar waters. When at 

 last convinced of the absence of continental lands in the regions traversed by 

 Cook, his companion Forster advanced the hypothesis that nature had readjusted the 

 equilibrium between the two hemispheres of the planetory orb by depositing on 

 the bed of the Antarctic Ocean rocky masses of greater density than elsewhere. 



Exploration of the Antarctic Waters. 



Although in the pride of his immense triumphs. Cook placed limits to the 

 genius of man, declaring that no future navigator would penetrate farther south- 

 wards, his record has already been beaten, and since his time the known surface 

 of the ocean has been enlarged in the direction of the South Pole. The lands 

 discovered in some jjlaces are sufficiently contiguous to each other to be regarded 

 as very probably forming a continuous seaboard. They would thus collectively 

 constitute one of the largest islands on the surface of the globe. 



The most extensive mass of dry land in the Antarctic Zone occurs to the south 

 of Australia. In 18-39, Ballenyhad already discovered an archipelago of volcanoes 

 in the immediate neighbourhood of the polar circle. According to his estimate 

 the insular cone of Young Island, which is completely snowclad, would appear to 

 attain an elevation of at least 12,000 feet. Another much lower island was seen 

 to eject two columns of vapour. But the valleys and ravines between the peaks 

 are everj^where filled with ice or glaciers, so that the bare rock is visible only 

 where the action of the waves has revealed the black lavas of the cliffs and 

 headlands surmounted by a covering of white snow. No creeks occur, nor even 

 any strand, except here and there a narrow beach strewn with ashes and shingly 

 scoriœ. Sailing to the west of this archipelago, mainly aboiit the sixty-fifth degree 

 south latitude, Balleny thought he sighted land in two places, and even gave the 

 name of Sabrina Land to some high ground dimly seezi from a distance. 



The following year the French navigator, Dumont d'Urville, and the American. 



