Page:Transactions NZ Institute Volume 15.djvu/589

Rh with the exception of some of the islands in the neighbourhood of Cape Horn, it is the nearest point of land to the great Antarctic Continent. It lies considerably to the south of Kerguelen Land, or the Crozets.

On this account then considerable interest attaches to it. I therefore availed myself of the opportunity offered me by Messrs. Elder and Nichols, in the latter end of 1880, for a trip down to it in the "Jessie Niccol" schooner. It is the results of this excursion that I propose to give in this paper.

The changes which the New Zealand flora undergoes in the Auckland and Campbell Islands have been often noted, but almost nothing was known of its characters in Macquarie Island. I wished to notice how many plants survived in that high latitude, and what changes in appearance and habit these had undergone in suiting themselves to the rigorous climate; whether our New Zealand alpine forms were to be found there at the sea level, and whether there were to be found any new forms unrepresented even in the highest and most remote parts of New Zealand.

Four or five of the Macquarie Island plants had been sent to the Hooker Herbarium by Mr. Fraser, of the Sydney Botanic Gardens, about fifty years ago. I cannot, however, make out whether he had visited the island himself, or whether one of the sealers had brought the plants to him.

I was also anxious to see and study, so far as practicable, the sea elephants, which make it their summer resort. They never, so far as I know, come as far north as either Campbell Island or the Auckland group, so in this part of the world Macquarie Island is the only place where they can be observed.

Macquarie Island lies about 600 miles to the south-west of New Zealand, more than twice as far away as the Auckland group, and is separated from that group and from Campbell Island by very much deeper water than that which lies between them and New Zealand. There is a great valley 3,000 fathoms deep between Macquarie Island and the Auckland and Campbell Islands, while the sea between them and New Zealand is not 1,000 fathoms deep.

It is wrongly put down on all the charts. For the following correct position I am indebted to Captain Cowper, who, in the "Jessie Niccol," has made a number of trips to the island:—

It is about 18 miles long and 5 miles broad, its east side lying N. ½ W. and S. ½ E. magnetic.