Page:Polar Exploration - Bruce - 1911.djvu/155

Rh successfully carried out marine biological investigation well within the Antarctic Circle. During a cruise and remarkable drift south of 70° S. latitude between 80° and 102° W. longitude, as well as during her more easterly cruise along the west coast of Graham Land, frequent dredgings were made which resulted in a very remarkable collection of deep-sea marine animals being secured. Most of this collection was made in water of about 200 or 250 fathoms; but north of 70° S. a few dredgings were made in depths of more than 1,400 fathoms. The reports on this rich collection of Antarctic marine animals are now nearly completed in a large series of valuable volumes giving an account of the scientific results of the voyage. Never before had such a large collection of marine animals been made in the Antarctic Regions. Fishes, echinoderms, crustaceans, polychæts, gorgonids, bryozoa, and, in fact, representatives of almost every order of invertebrates, were obtained. The Gauss, Discovery, and Antarctic (1901–04) were a series of expeditions which continued the exploration of the sea in relation to marine animals, but their work was not nearly so comprehensive in this direction as that of the Belgica. The Gauss trawled in greater depths, but not nearly in such high southern latitudes. The work of all these expeditions has, however, added