Page:A Voyage of Discovery and Research in the Southern and Antarctic Regions Vol 2.djvu/406

362 oceanic blue to a light olive brown. At noon we were in latitude 67° 6′ S., longitude 9° W., magnetic dip 62° 42′ S., variation 8° 12′ W. The evening was fine, and with a fresh breeze from S.E. we made good progress to the S.W., passing only a few bergs and some straggling pieces of ice. The stars shone with great brilliancy during the night, a sight we had not witnessed for a long time, having been obscured during the last month by almost continual fog and snow; indeed, there were only three days in which we were not assailed by snow showers.

Beautiful as had been the night, the morning broke still more splendidly; the sun rose out of the horizon bright and clear; and as the day advanced the effects of his rays, feeble as they were, from their obliquity, had an animating influence on us all who had not seen his unclouded face for a space of nearly six weeks. It afforded me the opportunity I had long desired, of obtaining actinometric observations, in which, with the assistance of Commander Bird, I succeeded, and completed two sets of experiments with each of two different instruments; by which the absolute value of the sun's radiating power in these latitudes can be accurately determined.

At noon our latitude was 68° 14′ S., longitude 12° 20′ W., magnetic dip 63° 28′ S., and variation 6° 3′ W. Numerous fragments of bergs were passed, from which we might have replenished our almost exhausted store of water, but the sea was