INTRODUCTION 



meteorological observations while the ship proceeded to 

 the River Plate. On her return in the following year 

 the Argentine Government took over the meteorological 

 work in the South Orkneys, which has been kept up ever 

 since to the great advancement of knowledge. The Scotia 

 made another dash to the south on the same meridian as 

 before, and on March 2, 1904, when in 72° 18' South and 

 18° West, a high ice-barrier was seen stretching from 

 north-east to south-west, the depth of the sea being 1131 

 fathoms, a marked diminution from the prevailing depths. 

 The Barrier was occasionally seen in intervals of mist, 

 and March 6 being a clear day allowed the edge to be fol- 

 lowed to the south-west to a point one hundred and fifty 

 miles from the place where it was first sighted. The 

 depth, two and a half miles from the Barrier edge, pack- 

 ice preventing a nearer approach, was 159 fathoms. The 

 description of the appearance of the Barrier given in the 

 " Cruise of the Scotia" is very brief: " The surface of 

 this great Inland Ice of which the Barrier was the 

 terminal face or sea-front seemed to rise up very gradually 

 in undulating slopes, and faded away in height and dis- 

 tance into the sky, though in one place there appeared to 

 be the outline of distant hills; if so they were entirely 

 ice-covered, no naked rock being visible." Ross or Moore 

 would certainly have charted this as an " appearance of 

 land"; Bruce knew from the shoaling water and the 

 nature of the deposits that he was in the vicinity of land 

 and gave it the name of Coats Land after his principal 

 supporters. He could get no farther and returned from 

 74° 1' South in 22° West, a point almost as far south 

 as Weddell had got in his attempt one hundred and eighty 

 miles farther west. The Scotia rendered immense service 

 to science by her large biological collections, her unique 

 series of deep-sea soundings in high latitudes and the 

 permanent gain of a sub-Antarctic meteorological station. 



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