Page:A Voyage of Discovery and Research in the Southern and Antarctic Regions Vol 1.djvu/232

152 made on shore, the other officers and crew of the ships were engaged procuring firewood, completing the water, and making the necessary preparations in the vessels for our voyage to the southward.

Mr. Tucker and Mr. Davis were employed under my directions surveying and sounding the harbour. Mr. Oakley was sent to examine Enderby Island, where also he landed some rabbits, and brought back with him the nests and young birds of several small kinds of petrel he found there. The medical officers having fortunately no sick to attend to, zealously devoted themselves to increase our collections of natural history in all its branches. Dr. Hooker brought on board a tree fern between three and four feet high, with fronds between four and five feet long: this and Campbell Island are the highest south latitudes they have yet been found in; and many curious and beautiful sea-weeds were gathered along the shores of the inlet. The seine was hauled, but with very indifferent success. A seal was seen with a good-sized fish in its mouth, proving their presence; but only two or three were taken,—a small flat-fish, near the head of Laurie Harbour, and the others about nine inches long, are described by Dr. Richardson under the name of Notothenia, of which genus he remarks the designation has reference to its high southern habitat, where it is probably represented by one or more species in almost every degree of longitude.