Page:The Botany of the Antarctic Voyage.djvu/14

vi, whence the real object of the voyage, namely that which included South Polar Discovery, would commence. On the 6th of April 1840 we quitted Simon's Bay, and first entered a cold and inhospitable latitude (42° S.) on the 17th of the same month; then, only four days after, holding a westward course, we passed to the south of Marion's Island, formed of fiat terraces of black volcanic rock and cone-shaped mountains, often of a reddish tinge, and towering to a considerable height. Here occurred the first botanical phenomenon, the Macrocystis pyrifera (a remarkable gigantic seaweed), being exceedingly abundant. The ships were hove to between Marion's and Prince Edward's Islands, with the view to going ashore the following day; but during the night a heavy gale arose which drove them far to the westward, thus disappointing the hopes which had been formed of collecting objects of natural history on an island never previously explored by any scientific individual.

On the 28th, after a succession of storms, the Crozet Islands were gained: this group lies far to the westward of the position that had been assigned to it, namely in lat. 47½° S. and long. 46–48° E.; and here the same disappointment awaited us, for after being blown off, and again on the 1st of May beating up to Possession, the most eastern of the cluster, the threatening appearance of the weather forbade any attempt to land. The Crozet Islands are all volcanic, and of the wildest and most rocky aspect; the harbours are very few, and some of the islands are entirely inaccessible. The mountains rise in peaks and cones to an elevation of 4000–5000 feet, exhibiting patches of perpetual snow on the summits, while dense fogs frequently envelope their bases, borne from the sea, to such an elevation, that the highest points alone are visible. To all appearance the vegetation is equally scanty and stunted as that which Kerguelen's Island afterwards afforded, and the questions which were put to a party of miserable sealers who came off to the ship, elicited no satisfactory information as to whether the valuable "Cabbage" of the latter island also inhabits the Crozet group. Scudding before heavy westerly gales, on the 6th of May a remarkable conical rock, called Bligh's Cap, was descried; it lies off the north-west extremity of Kerguelen's Island; but thick weather prevented Sir James Ross from making the land, from which the ships were again driven to a distance of 150 miles and obliged to beat back, finally casting anchor in Christmas Harbour, on the 12th of May 1840.

At Kerguelen's Island, all the plants that had been originally detected by the