VII. Contributions to terrestrial magnetism.—No. Vl

• Published in: Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: The Royal Society 1844
• Subjects: Antarctic; Endeavour; New Zealand; Pacific; The Antarctic; Antarc*
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rstl.1844.0007; https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rstl.1844.0007

§ 10. Observations made on Board Her Majesty's Ships Erebus and Terror, from June 1841 to August 1842, in the Antarctic Expedition under the command of Captain Sir James Clark Ross, R .N ., F.R.S. I have now to lay before the Royal Society the results of the magnetic observations made at sea by the Antarctic Expedition during the second year of its opera­tions in the southern hemisphere. Leaving Hobarton early in July 1841, the ships proceeded in the first instance to Sydney in Australia, and from thence to the Bay of Islands in New Zealand, where they remained until the return of the season of navigation in the high latitudes. Quitting New Zealand in November, the ice was met with and entered in a somewhat lower latitude than in the preceding year, and in a longitude considerably to the east of the former track. The obstacles which the ice presented to their progress appear to have been greater than on the former occasion; they were however surmounted, and in February 1842 the ships again reached the ice barrier, or glacier, in latitude 78°, by which they had been stopped in the preceding year. After an unsuccessful endeavour to turn the eastern extre­mity of the glacier, the advance of the season compelled their return to the lower latitudes; they quitted the Antarctic Circle in March 1842, and keeping nearly in the 60th parallel, crossed the whole breadth of the southern Pacific Ocean to the Falkland Islands, where they arrived in April. I proceed at once to the examination in detail of the magnetic observations made during this period.