Page:A Voyage of Discovery and Research in the Southern and Antarctic Regions Vol 1.djvu/344

246 away. The cape with the islet off it was named after Professor Gauss, the great mathematician of Göttingen, who has done more than any other philosopher of the present day to advance the science of terrestrial magnetism.

We were at this time in latitude 76° 12′ S., longitude 164° E.; the magnetic dip 88° 40′, and the variation 109° 24′ E. We were therefore only one hundred and sixty miles from the pole.

Had it been possible to have found a place of security upon any part of this coast where we might have wintered, in sight of the brilliant burning mountain, and at so short a distance from the magnetic pole, both of those interesting spots might easily have been reached by travelling parties in the following spring; but all our efforts to effect that object proved quite unsuccessful; and although our hopes of complete attainment were not realised, yet it was some satisfaction to know that we had approached the pole some hundreds of miles nearer than any of our predecessors; and from the multitude of observations that were made in so many different directions from it, its position may be determined with nearly as much accuracy as if we had actually reached the spot itself.

It was nevertheless painfully vexatious to behold