Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 10.djvu/209

Rh 183o—1s7sJ 1103'. reaching St Paul Loanda on the west coast. Mr Stanley followed in 1874. He circumnavigated and ﬁxed the out- line of the Victoria Nyanza, followed Cameron across Lake Tanganyika to Nyangwe, and then descended the great lliver Congo, discovering its course, and connecting the work of Livingstone with that of Tuckey. Mr Young has since completed the survey of Lake Nyassa; Nachtigal has sup- plemented the work of Barth and Vogel in the Tchad region ; while Duveyrier and other French explorers have examined the region of the Sahara. In the far south the Limpopo basin, and the country intervening between the Limpopo and Zambesi, have been made known to us by St Vincent Erskine and Elton, Carl .Iaucl1 and Baines. Thus the extent of the unknown parts of Africa has been rapidly curtailed, while our knowledge has been widened during the last half century. On the American continent scientiﬁc progress has been made in the United States and the dominion of Canada, ' ‘ ' where, within the last half century, boundary commissions and surveys have ﬁxed positions and described previously tl1_ unknown regions of great extent. In South America there 9”” are vast unexplored regions to the eastward of the Andes, and in the basins of the great rivers. Sir Robert Schem- burgk did much valuable work in Guiana, and explored the delta of the Orinoco in 1841; while Spix and Martins, Poeppig and Castelnau, Maw and Smyth, Herndon and Gibbon, Spruce and Bates, Wallace and Chandless, and others, explored the basin of the Amazon. The labours of Pissis in Chili, of Ilaimondi and Werthermann in Peru, of Codazzi in Colombia and Venezuela, and of Morales and others in the Argentine Republic, have been most valuable to'geographical science. In Patagonia, Fitz Royzand King explored the Santa Cruz river, Cox and Morales have since added to our knowledge, and Commander Musters, It.N., was the ﬁrst traveller who traversed the whole of Patagonia from south to north, 960 miles of latitude, of which 780 were previously unknown to Europeans. The difficulty of exploring the interior of the Australian ”- continent was caused by. the scarcity of water, and the immense distances it was necessary to cross without supplies of any kind. Hence the work of exploration has required and called forth high and noble q11alities in a degree quite equal to any that have been recorded in any other part of the world. The names of St11rt and Leichhardt, of Eyre and Grey, of Macdouall Stewart and Burke, of Gregory, of Forrest and Warburton, will be handed dow11 as those of intrepid and courageous explorers who laid open the secrets of the interior of Australia. The Paciﬁc Ocean was explored by numerous expeditions during the 18th and early part of the 19th centuries. Still much remained to be done in the way of veriﬁcation and more complete survey. From 1826 to 1836 Captain Fitzroy, with the naturalist Darwin, surveyed Magellan’s Strait and the west coast of South America; and further important surveys in the Paciﬁc were afterwards executed by Captain Wilkes of the United States Navy, and by Belcher, Kellett, and Denham. rtc But the great geographical work of the present century ﬁle‘?-“V must be the extension of discovery i11 the Arctic and .0’_ A11ta1'ctic regions. Progress has been made in both direc- tions, and in both much remains to be done. It is this polar work which calls forth the highest qualities of an ex- plorer; it is here that the greatest difﬁculties must be overcome; and it is here that the most valuable scientiﬁc results are to be obtained. Between the years 1830 and 1843 much was done in the Antarctic regions. In 1830-32 Mr John Biscoe, R.N., made avoyage in a brig belonging to Messrs Enderby, and discovered “ Enderby Land ” and “ Graham Land ” in 67° S. ; and from 1837 to 1840 Dumont d’Urville discovered cri- ulc. (} Id (} 11 IX 1? II TE 1195 “ La Terre Adele " and “ Coté Clarie,” going as far south as 66° 30'. Auckland Island was discovered by Bristow in 1806. In 1839 Balleny, in another vessel belonging to Messrs Enderby, discovered the Balleny Islands in 66° 44’ S., and Sabrina Island in 65° 10' S. The Antarctic expedition of Sir James I-toss sailed from England in 1839. In 1840 Ross. Sir James explored Kerguelen Island, and wintered at Hobart Town. He then visited the Auckland Islands, and, crossing the Antarctic Circle, reached the great icy barrier, and discovered Victoria Land, with its lofty volcanoes, in January 1841. He gained the latitude of 78° 4' S. in 187° E., and established the continuity of the southern continent from 70° to 79° S. In 1841 Ross again wintered at Van Diemen’s Land, and in January 1842 crosserl the Antarc- tic circle in 156° 28' IV. He was once more stopped by the great icy barrier in 78° 10' S., after having penetrated through ice ﬂoes of more than 1000 miles in width. Extra- ordinary dangers were encountered ill the ice, many valuable observations were taken, and in 1842 the expedition wintered at the Falkland Islands. In the following season another exploring voyage was made beyond the Antarctic Circle, and in September 1843 this most important expedi- tion returned to England. On the return of Sir James Iloss attention was once more turned to the Arctic regions; and in the spring of 1845 Sir J ohn Franklin’s Arctic expedition, consisting of the Franklin. “Ereb11s ” and “ Terror,” sailed from Woolwich. His in- structions were to make the North-West Passage, but the main object of the expedition was the advancement cf science, and to secure it the most accomplished oﬁicers in the navy were appointed, as well as the eminent naturalist Dr Goodsir. It is now known that, in the ﬁrst and second seasons, the expedition was very successful. In 1845 Sir John Franklin made a remarkable run up Wellington Channel to 77° N.; i11 1846, proceeding south, he had almost achieved the N orth—West Passage when his shils were permanently beset to the north of King William Island in 70° 5' N. and 98° 23' W. Here the veteran explorer died on June 11, 1847; and all his companions perished in the attempt to reach one of the Hudson’s Bay Company's settlements iii the summer of 1848. Those among them who reached Cape Herschel, and it is certain that some did reach that point, undoubtedly discovered the N orth-West Passage. The expeditions which were se11t out in search of Sir John Franklin's ships did 1m1ch important geographical work ; but their principal use was the establislnnent, through their means, of the true method of extensive Arctic exploration. The grand_object of the oﬁicers and men em- ployed on this service was the relief of their missing country- men, and their utmost efforts were devoted to the examina- tion of the largest possible extent of coast-line. H e11ce the discovery of the modern system of Arctic sledge-travelling, the only eﬁicient means of exploring the icy regions around the North Pole. In 1848-49 Sir James Iloss discovered the western side of North Somerset, and Sir Leopold .l‘Clintock served his ﬁrst apprenticeship in the ice under that veteran explorer. Austin’s expedition sailed in 1850, and wintered nearly in the centre of the region discovered by Parry during his ﬁrst voyage. It was then that M‘Clintock developed and put in practice the system of Arctic sledge- travelling which has since achieved such grand results; and Captain Ommanney, M ‘Clintock, and his colleagues Sherard Osborn, Frederick Mecham, Robert Aldrich, and Vesey Hamilton made what were then unparalleled journeys_1n various directions. In December 1849, also, Captalns Collinson and M‘Clure went out to conduct further search by way of Behring Strait. The former made the most remarkable voyage on record along the north coast of America, while M‘Clure took his ship between the west