464 T. W. E. DAVID, W. F. SMEETH, AND J. A. SCHOFIELD. 
the temperature of the water flowing from some being 140° Fahr. 
This expedition discovered Adélie Land. The mainland appeared 
to be completely swathed in snow and ice, but nine small islands 
off the mainland were found to be more or less free from ice, and 
to consist of granite and gneiss, the folia of which strike in an 
east and west direction. 
In 1840 Commander Wilkes in the U.S.A. Corvette Vincennes 
discovered Wilkes Land. In January 1841, Sir James Clarke 
Ross made his memorable discovery of Victoria Land. With the 
object of trying to find the South Magnetic Pole, as he had already 
found the North Magnetic Pole, he forced his well fortitied ships 
through the heavy pack ice which he encountered in latitude 
about 67° S., and longitude 1744° E. It was a very formidable 
pack. In four or five days, however, he forced his way through 
it, and entered comparatively open water beyond, a great ocean 
pool about six hundred miles in diameter. Bounding this on the 
west was the magnificent chain of snow clad volcanoes of Victoria 
Land. Ross traced the coast for five hundred miles southwards 
until he encountered the Great Ice Barrier terminating seawards 
in a sheer wall of ice, from one hundred and eighty to two hundred 
feet high, through which, in Ross’ words, ‘‘he could no more sail 
his ships than he could sail them through the cliffs of Dover.” 
His dredgings showed that marine forms of animal life, especially 
polyzoa, were abundant right up to the edge of the Great Ice 
Barrier. Ross states (op. cit.) that on January 19th, 1841, when 
off the coast of South Victoria, in latitude 72° 31’ S., longitude 
173° 39’ E., “the dredge was put over in two hundred and seventy 
fathoms water, and after trailing along the ground for some time 
was hauled in. It was found to contain a block of grey granite, 
composed of large crystals of quartz, mica and felspar, with 
apparently a clean and recent fracture, as if lately broken off 
from the main rock, and had probably been deposited by the 
agency of an iceberg. McCormick, the surgeon of the Hrebuss 
frequently found fragments of granite in the stomachs of the 
penguins,” 
