ANTARCTIC VOYAGES OF DISCOVERY. 



401 



CHAPTER XXXVIII. 



ANTARCTIC VOYAGES OF DISCOVERY. 



Cook's Discoveries in the Antarctic Ocean. — Bellinghausen. — Weddell. — Biscoe. — Balleny. — Dumont 

 d'Urville. — Wilkes. — Sir James Ross crosses the Antarctic Circle on New Year's Day, 1841. — Dis- 

 covers Victoria Land. — Dangerous Landing on Franklin Island. — An Eruption of Mount Erebus.— 

 The Great Ice Barrier. — Providential Escape. — Dreadful Gale —Collision. — Hazardous Passage be- 

 tween two Icebergs. — Termination of the Voyage. 



13EF0RE Cook, no navigator had left Europe with the clear design of pen- 

 -^-^ etrating into the Antarctic regions. Dirk Gheritz indeed had been driv- 

 en by a furious storm far to the south of Cape Horn, and became the involun- 

 tary discoverer of the 'New Shetland Islands in 1600 ; but his voyage was soon 

 forgotten, and in an age when the love of gold or the desire of conquest were 

 the sole promoters of maritime enterprise, no mariner felt inclined to follow on 

 his track, and to plunge into a sea where most probably he would find nothing 

 but ice-fields and icebergs to reward his efforts. Nearly two centuries later a 

 more scientific age directed its attention to the unknown regions of the distant 

 south, and Cook sailed forth to probe the secrets of the Antarctic Seas. This 

 dangerous task he executed with an intrepidity unparalleled in the annals of 

 navigation. Beyond 60° of southern latitude, he cruised over a space of more 

 than 100° of longitude, and on January 30, 1774, penetrated as far as 71° of 

 southern latitude, where he was stopped by impenetrable masses of ice. Such 

 were the difficulties encountered from dense fogs, snow-storms, intense cold, 

 and every thing that can render navigation dangerous, that in his opinion the 

 lands situated to the southward of his discoveries must forever remain un- 

 known. 



Again for many a year no one attempted to enter a field where the most 

 celebrated of modern mariners had found but a few desert islands (South 

 Georgia, Sandwich's Land, Southern Thule) until Smith's casual rediscovery of 

 New South Shetland in 1819 once more turned the current of maritime ex- 

 ploration to the Antarctic Seas. 



Soon afterwards a Russian expedition under Lazareff and Bellinghausen 

 discovered (January, 1821), in 69° 3' S. lat., the islands Paul the First and 

 Alexander, the most southern lands that had ever been visited by man. 



The year after Captain Weddell, a sealer, penetrated into the icy ocean as 

 far as 74° 15' S. lat., 3° nearer to the pole than had been attained by Cook. 

 The sea lay invitingly open, but as the season was far advanced, and Weddell 

 apprehended the dangers of the return voyage, he steered again to the north. 



In 1831 Biscoe discovered Enderby Land, and soon afterwards Graham's 

 Land, to which the gratitude of geographers has since given the discoverer's 

 name. In 1839 Balleny revealed the existence of the group of islands called 



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