Chapter 16

It had been Captain Guy’s original intention, after satisfying
himself about the Auroras, to proceed through the Strait of
Magellan, and up along the western coast of Patagonia; but
information received at Tristan d’Acunha induced him to steer to
the southward, in the hope of falling in with some small islands
said to lie about the parallel of 60 degrees S., longitude 41
degrees 20’ W. In the event of his not discovering these lands,
he designed, should the season prove favourable, to push on
toward the pole. Accordingly, on the twelfth of December, we made
sail in that direction. On the eighteenth we found ourselves
about the station indicated by Glass, and cruised for three days
in that neighborhood without finding any traces of the islands he
had mentioned. On the twenty-first, the weather being unusually
pleasant, we again made sail to the southward, with the
resolution of penetrating in that course as far as possible.
Before entering upon this portion of my narrative, it may be as
well, for the information of those readers who have paid little
attention to the progress of discovery in these regions, to give
some brief account of the very few attempts at reaching the
southern pole which have hitherto been made.

That of Captain Cook was the first of which we have any distinct
account. In 1772 he sailed to the south in the Resolution,
accompanied by Lieutenant Furneaux in the Adventure. In December
he found himself as far as the fifty-eighth parallel of south
latitude, and in longitude 26 degrees 57’ E. Here he met with
narrow fields of ice, about eight or ten inches thick, and
running northwest and southeast. This ice was in large cakes, and
usually it was packed so closely that the vessel had great
difficulty in forcing a passage. At this period Captain Cook
supposed, from the vast number of birds to be seen, and from
other indications, that he was in the near vicinity of land. He
kept on to the southward, the weather being exceedingly cold,
until he reached the sixty-fourth parallel, in longitude 38
degrees 14’ E. Here he had mild weather, with gentle breezes, for
five days, the thermometer being at thirty-six. In January, 1773,
the vessels crossed the Antarctic circle, but did not succeed in
penetrating much farther; for upon reaching latitude 67 degrees
15’ they found all farther progress impeded by an immense body of
ice, extending all along the southern horizon as far as the eye
could reach. This ice was of every variety—and some large floes
of it, miles in extent, formed a compact mass, rising eighteen or
twenty feet above the water. It being late in the season, and no
hope entertained of rounding these obstructions, Captain Cook now
reluctantly turned to the northward.

In the November following he renewed his search in the Antarctic.
In latitude 59 degrees 40’ he met with a strong current setting
to the southward. In December, when the vessels were in latitude
67 degrees 31’, longitude 142 degrees 54’ W., the cold was
excessive, with heavy gales and fog. Here also birds were
abundant; the albatross, the penguin, and the peterel especially.
In latitude 70 degrees 23’ some large islands of ice were
encountered, and shortly afterward the clouds to the southward
were observed to be of a snowy whiteness, indicating the vicinity
of field ice. In latitude 71 degrees 10’, longitude 106 degrees
54’ W., the navigators were stopped, as before, by an immense
frozen expanse, which filled the whole area of the southern
horizon. The northern edge of this expanse was ragged and broken,
so firmly wedged together as to be utterly impassible, and
extending about a mile to the southward. Behind it the frozen
surface was comparatively smooth for some distance, until
terminated in the extreme background by gigantic ranges of ice
mountains, the one towering above the other. Captain Cook
concluded that this vast field reached the southern pole or was
joined to a continent. Mr. J. N. Reynolds, whose great exertions
and perseverance have at length succeeded in getting set on foot
a national expedition, partly for the purpose of exploring these
regions, thus speaks of the attempt of the Resolution. “We are
not surprised that Captain Cook was unable to go beyond 71
degrees 10’, but we are astonished that he did attain that point
on the meridian of 106 degrees 54’ west longitude. Palmer’s Land
lies south of the Shetland, latitude sixty-four degrees, and
tends to the southward and westward farther than any navigator
has yet penetrated. Cook was standing for this land when his
progress was arrested by the ice; which, we apprehend, must
always be the case in that point, and so early in the season as
the sixth of January—and we should not be surprised if a portion
of the icy mountains described was attached to the main body of
Palmer’s Land, or to some other portions of land lying farther to
the southward and westward.”

In 1803, Captains Kreutzenstern and Lisiausky were dispatched by
Alexander of Russia for the purpose of circumnavigating the
globe. In endeavouring to get south, they made no farther than 59
degrees 58’, in longitude 70 degrees 15’ W. They here met with
strong currents setting eastwardly. Whales were abundant, but
they saw no ice. In regard to this voyage, Mr. Reynolds observes
that, if Kreutzenstern had arrived where he did earlier in the
season, he must have encountered ice—it was March when he reached
the latitude specified. The winds, prevailing, as they do, from
the southward and westward, had carried the floes, aided by
currents, into that icy region bounded on the north by Georgia,
east by Sandwich Land and the South Orkneys, and west by the
South Shetland islands.

In 1822, Captain James Weddell, of the British navy, with two
very small vessels, penetrated farther to the south than any
previous navigator, and this, too, without encountering
extraordinary difficulties. He states that although he was
frequently hemmed in by ice before reaching the seventy-second
parallel, yet, upon attaining it, not a particle was to be
discovered, and that, upon arriving at the latitude of 74 degrees
15’, no fields, and only three islands of ice were visible. It is
somewhat remarkable that, although vast flocks of birds were
seen, and other usual indications of land, and although, south of
the Shetlands, unknown coasts were observed from the masthead
tending southwardly, Weddell discourages the idea of land
existing in the polar regions of the south.

On the 11th of January, 1823, Captain Benjamin Morrell, of the
American schooner Wasp, sailed from Kerguelen’s Land with a view
of penetrating as far south as possible. On the first of February
he found himself in latitude 64 degrees 52’ S., longitude 118
degrees 27’ E. The following passage is extracted from his
journal of that date. “The wind soon freshened to an eleven-knot
breeze, and we embraced this opportunity of making to the west;
being however convinced that the farther we went south beyond
latitude sixty-four degrees, the less ice was to be apprehended,
we steered a little to the southward, until we crossed the
Antarctic circle, and were in latitude 69 degrees 15’ E. In this
latitude there was no field ice, and very few ice islands in
sight.”

Under the date of March fourteenth I find also this entry. “The
sea was now entirely free of field ice, and there were not more
than a dozen ice islands in sight. At the same time the
temperature of the air and water was at least thirteen degrees
higher (more mild) than we had ever found it between the
parallels of sixty and sixty-two south. We were now in latitude
70 degrees 14’ S., and the temperature of the air was
forty-seven, and that of the water forty-four. In this situation
I found the variation to be 14 degrees 27’ easterly, per
azimuth.... I have several times passed within the Antarctic
circle, on different meridians, and have uniformly found the
temperature, both of the air and the water, to become more and
more mild the farther I advanced beyond the sixty-fifth degree of
south latitude, and that the variation decreases in the same
proportion. While north of this latitude, say between sixty and
sixty-five south, we frequently had great difficulty in finding a
passage for the vessel between the immense and almost innumerable
ice islands, some of which were from one to two miles in
circumference, and more than five hundred feet above the surface
of the water.”

Being nearly destitute of fuel and water, and without proper
instruments, it being also late in the season, Captain Morrell
was now obliged to put back, without attempting any further
progress to the westward, although an entirely open, sea lay
before him. He expresses the opinion that, had not these
overruling considerations obliged him to retreat, he could have
penetrated, if not to the pole itself, at least to the
eighty-fifth parallel. I have given his ideas respecting these
matters somewhat at length, that the reader may have an
opportunity of seeing how far they were borne out by my own
subsequent experience.

In 1831, Captain Briscoe, in the employ of the Messieurs Enderby,
whale-ship owners of London, sailed in the brig Lively for the
South Seas, accompanied by the cutter Tula. On the twenty-eighth
of February, being in latitude 66 degrees 30’ S., longitude 47
degrees 31’ E., he descried land, and “clearly discovered through
the snow the black peaks of a range of mountains running E. S.
E.” He remained in this neighbourhood during the whole of the
following month, but was unable to approach the coast nearer than
within ten leagues, owing to the boisterous state of the weather.
Finding it impossible to make further discovery during this
season, he returned northward to winter in Van Diemen’s Land.

In the beginning of 1832 he again proceeded southwardly, and on
the fourth of February land was seen to the southeast in latitude
67 degrees 15’ longitude 69 degrees 29’ W. This was soon found to
be an island near the headland of the country he had first
discovered. On the twenty-first of the month he succeeded in
landing on the latter, and took possession of it in the name of
William IV, calling it Adelaide’s Island, in honour of the
English queen. These particulars being made known to the Royal
Geographical Society of London, the conclusion was drawn by that
body “that there is a continuous tract of land extending from 47
degrees 30’ E. to 69 degrees 29’ W. longitude, running the
parallel of from sixty-six to sixty-seven degrees south
latitude.” In respect to this conclusion Mr. Reynolds observes:
“In the correctness of it we by no means concur; nor do the
discoveries of Briscoe warrant any such indifference. It was
within these limits that Weddel proceeded south on a meridian to
the east of Georgia, Sandwich Land, and the South Orkney and
Shetland islands.” My own experience will be found to testify
most directly to the falsity of the conclusion arrived at by the
society.

These are the principal attempts which have been made at
penetrating to a high southern latitude, and it will now be seen
that there remained, previous to the voyage of the Jane, nearly
three hundred degrees of longitude in which the Antarctic circle
had not been crossed at all. Of course a wide field lay before us
for discovery, and it was with feelings of most intense interest
that I heard Captain Guy express his resolution of pushing boldly
to the southward.