438 



Messrs. Carpenter, Jeffreys, and Thomson [Nov. 18, 



and gravel brought up by the dredge, of a more decided movement of water 

 than is presented in the Cold area generally, the bottom of which generally 

 consists of fine sand, sometimes with an admixture of clay, including 

 stones but little rolled. And as our subsequent Soundings have led us to 

 believe that we were here on the western border of the Cold area, and 

 that its stream of frigid water is reduced at the same time in breadth and 

 depth, before discharging itself into the deep Oceanic basin (§ 104), a more 

 rapid movement is precisely what might be expected. 



66. Altering our course now to the E.S.E., we took another Sounding on 

 the evening.of the same day (Station 53), after a run of about 25 miles, 

 and found the depth increased to 490 fathoms, and the minimum (which 

 we shall now call the bottom) temperature reduced to 30°. This course 

 having been continued during the night, we found ourselves (Station 54), 

 early on the morning of August 19th, in Lat. 59° 56' and Long. 6° 27', 

 where the depth was 363 fathoms, and the bottom-temperature 31 c, 4. It 

 was thus obvious that we were still in the Cold area, although we had 

 come back almost exactly to the latitude of Station 50, and were more 

 than twelve miles to the south of the lowest parallel to which we had 

 traced it last year. (We subsequently traced it, at Station 86, about nine 

 miles still further south.) The coincidence of Depths as well as of Latitudes 

 between Stations 50 and 54, with deeper water both north and south of 

 them, shows that the bed of the channel here rises into a ridge, which has 

 probably something to do with the direction of the course of the flow 

 along its bottom. — We then again turned northwards, and in the after- 

 noon of the same day found that our depth (Station 55) had increased to 

 605 fathoms, whilst the bottom-temperature was somewhat below 30°. 

 Our Soundings were frequently repeated in this part of the Area, with 

 great uniformity in their results, both as to Depth and Temperature ; and 

 our Dredging operations were carried on with little intermission. As the 

 wind and swell were very moderate (although we were here almost con- 

 stantly in a cold damp mist, which sometimes gave place to a mizzling 

 rain), it was found convenient to put the dredge over soon after midnight, 

 and to let it drag until about 4 a.m., hauling it in at the beginning of 

 the morning watch. In this manner a rich harvest was frequently ob- 

 tained. The general results of our Zoological exploration of the Cold 

 Area may be best stated hereafter (§§ 74-80) in a collective form. 



67. As we wished to examine the shallow bank of 170 fathoms in the 

 middle of the Cold area, upon which we dredged last year (' Lightning' Re- 

 port, § 13), our course was now directed to the spot on which it had been laid 

 down in the Chart of the 1 Lightning 1 Expedition ; but we did not suc- 

 ceed in falling-in with it. The explanation of our failure seems to lie (1) 

 in the extremely limited area of this bank, as shown by the great depth of 

 water found in the ■ Lightning ' soundings on either side of it ; (2) in the 

 circumstance that both last year and this year, while we were working over this 

 ground, the sky was so overcast for several days together, that it was impos- 



