THE CHALLENGER 
349 
Admiralty placed her under the command of Captain 
George S. Nares, R.N., and the Royal Society nominated 
a civilian scientific staff under the direction of Professor 
C. Wyville Thomson, of Edinburgh. The captain and 
the professor shared the same day cabin, and their sleep- 
ing cabins were in positions of equal dignity and advan- 
tage. While the captain was of course the absolute 
master of the ship and crew, he was instructed to com- 
municate freely with the director on all matters touch- 
ing the scientific work of the expedition. Part of that 
work was confided to the naval officers who undertook 
the whole of the magnetic and meteorological observa- 
tions. The civilian staff, who were of course “ expected 
to conform” to the usages of a ship of war, included 
Mr. J. J. Wild, the Artist and Secretary to the Director, 
Mr. H. N. Moseley of Oxford and Mr. John Murray as 
biologists, and also Dr. von Willemoes Suhm, who died 
on the voyage ; Mr. J. Y. Buchanan was charged with the 
chemical, physical and geological work. 
The Circumnavigation Committee of the Royal Society 
drew up a scheme for the track of the exploring ship 
across the oceans, one portion of which may be quoted as 
showing to what extent the Challenger was intended to 
undertake Antarctic exploration. The route after lead- 
ing to the Cape of Good Hope was to proceed : 
“ Thence by the Marion Islands, the Crozets, and 
Kerguelen Land to Australia and New Zealand, going 
southward en route opposite the centre of the Indian 
Ocean, as near as may be with convenience and safety, to 
the southern Ice Barrier.” 
This was in order to investigate the especially interest- 
ing fauna of the Antarctic seas regarding which the 
Committee said: 
