THE EFFECT OF POLAR ICE ON THE WEATHER. ] 87 



between those indications of land near the Antarctic Circle 

 and Victoria Land. — (Sir Clements Markham, July 1901.) 



The day must come when our Commonwealth Nation 

 must recognize its duty in assisting scientific research, at 

 least so far as it may intimately concern its own interests. 

 I do not refer to extensive expeditions in search of the 

 South Pole, or the solution of general scientific problems, 

 but of comparatively trifling expeditions from time to time 

 of a few weeks duration, to enable scientists and others to 

 make such records as I have referred to, for the promotion 

 of future knowledge as to the primary causes affecting our 

 Australian climate. 



I have far exceeded the limits I had proposed to my pen 

 on this subject, but I hope that the points which have been 

 brought before you, selected from a large amount of accu- 

 mulated data, will have been of some interest to you. We 

 must all take the heartiest interest in the expedition about 

 to leave New Zealand under Lieut. Shackelton, r.n., with 

 our friend Professor David, but as it is bound for the Ross 

 Quadrant, we cannot expect it, for reasons above given, to 

 fulfil the hopes of the editor of the Evening Neivs, to be 

 informed "as to whether the conditions prevailing there 

 will influence our weather during the following year." 

 Deductions from observations to be therein made, as relat- 

 ing to phenomena which have occurred far away to the 

 leeward of our meridian, can only, as I have endeavoured 

 to explain, inferentially apply to what we may assume to 

 be cognate phenomena taking place in 4 our Antarctic 

 Ocean' under similar influences. But we feel sure that 

 the learned Professor, winds and weather permitting, will 

 do valuable service to general science, in his geological 

 researches and other scientific investigations, amongst 

 them I hope, on the structure of palseocrystic and recent 

 ice; in the other matter, one man on a short visit can but 



