Page:A Voyage of Discovery and Research in the Southern and Antarctic Regions Vol 1.djvu/278

190 by it against the land ice. Future navigators should therefore be on their guard in approaching the coast at this place.

After a long and heavy pull we regained our ships only a short time before so thick a fog came on, with a strong northerly breeze, that to have been a few minutes later, would have rendered our return to the ships impossible, and compelled us to have borne away for the shore again, to take up our quarters with the penguins, until the ships could have again approached it with safety. The weather obliged us now to stand out to sea. At night we had high winds with constant snow, and not meeting with any icebergs or loose ice, we kept the ships under easy sail, waiting a change of weather.

Some few whales and large flocks of Cape pigeons were seen; but the elegant white petrel, which seldom goes to any distance from the main pack, had, to our great satisfaction, quite deserted us.

The next morning a southerly gale came on, which reduced us to close-reefed topsails, and storm staysails; the weather also being very thick, we stood to the eastward, uncertain what we might meet with and were kept throughout the day and night in a state of great anxiety and watchfulness: but we were not sorry to find the ship labouring in a heavy sea, a sure indication of a great space of open water to windward, in the direction we were now most anxious to get.

At noon we were in lat. 72° 3′ S., and long. 172° 9′ E. Although blowing a hard gale with a