Page:A Voyage of Discovery and Research in the Southern and Antarctic Regions Vol 2.djvu/157

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Terror in company, by constantly firing guns; and finding it impossible to make the land, I was unwilling to lose time by waiting for more favourable weather; so, after heaving to for a short time in the afternoon, and sounding in one hundred fathoms, on a bank of greenish sand, we bore away to the south-westward, to get clear of the west reef before dark.

The temperature of the sea at one hundred fathoms on this bank was 50°·2, being as low as that at two hundred fathoms in the deep sea of yesterday.

We passed the west reef so near as to hear the roar of the sea breaking over it, but the thick fog prevented our seeing it; and as soon as we got well clear of all the known dangers that surround the Chatham Islands, we steered to the south-eastward, for the purpose of ascertaining a magnetic desideratum of great interest. It was supposed that a second point of greater magnetic intensity would be found in about the lat. 60° S. and long. 125° W., but as our time did not admit of our going to the spot, our course was so directed as to enable us to cross the lines of the Isodynamic oval in such places as should be best calculated to secure its accurate determination.

The wind prevailed from the N. E., but the foggy weather continued the greater part of the next day. Our observations at noon placed us in lat. 45° 40′ S., long. 176° 41′ W., by which also we found that we had been carried S. 8° W.