Proceedings, &c., for 1886. 301 



ENCLOSURES. 



Antaectic Eesearch, by Admiral Sir Erasmus Ommanney, 

 C.B., F.R.S., F.R.G.S. 



Aberdeen, September, 1885. 

 The object of this paper was to draw attention to the neglect of 

 the Antarctic Region as a field for exploration. The author gave a 

 summary of the work which has already been done by Cook, 

 Bellinghausen, Weddell, Biscoe, Balleny, Wilkes, D'Urville, James 

 Ross, and Nares (in the "Challenger"), and referred to a paper by 

 Dr. Newmayer on the subject, reproduced in Nature, Vol. YII» 

 The author concluded as follows : — I have thus laid before you but 

 a very imperfect description of these voyages ; to give the details of 

 the scientific results would occupy a separate paper. But I have 

 endeavoured to demonstrate how large a field remains open for 

 discovery. I think, from all we now know, we may infer that the 

 South Pole is capped by an eternal glacier, and from the nature of 

 the soundings obtained by Ross, it would appear that the great ice 

 wall along which the ships navigated was the termination of the 

 glacier — the source from which the inexhaustible supply of icebergs 

 and ice islands are launched into the Southern Ocean, many of which 

 drift to the low latitude of 42 degrees. The fact of finding 

 volcanoes of equal proportions to Etna or Mount Blanc creates a 

 zest for further research regarding that awful region on which neither 

 man nor quadruped ever existed. No man has ever wintered in the 

 Antarctic zone. The great desideratum now before us requires that 

 an expedition should pass a winter there, in order to compare the 

 conditions and phenomena with our Arctic knowledge. The 

 observations and data to be collected there throughout one year 

 could not fail to produce matter of the deepest importance to all 

 branches of science. I believe that such an achievement can be 

 accomplished in these days with ships properly designed and fitted 

 with the means of steam propulsion ; nor is it chimerical to conceive 

 a sledge party travelling over the glacier of Victoria Land towards 

 the South Pole after the example of Nordenskjold in Greenland. 

 Another interesting matter requires investigation, from the fact that 

 all the thermometers supplied for deep-sea temperatures to Ross were 

 faulty in construction, as they were then not adapted to register 

 accurately beneath the weighty oceanic pressure. Moreover, 

 another magnetic survey is most desirable, in order to determine 

 what secular change has been made in the elements of terrestrial 

 magnetism after an interval of forty years and more, when taken by 

 Ross. In fact, there exists a wide field open for investigation in the 

 unknown South Polar Sea. This paper will, I trust, be the prelude 

 for others to follow in arousing geographers and this powerful 

 association in promoting further research by despatching another 

 South Polar expedition, having for its object to secure a wintering 



