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National Geographic : 1894 Dec 29
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Cyrus C.Babb-GeographicNotes. D'Urville, at Adelie land, found a precipitous shore, with ele vations from 2,000 to 3,000 feet. The rocks of the neighboring islands were granites and gneisses. Wilkes found on an iceberg in the same vicinity large bowlders of red sandstone and basalt, with smaller gravels, stones, clays and mud. The dredgings of the Challenger produced from the great ocean basins volcanic debris, but as the Antarctic continent was approached quartz and granite fragments were found, and in the highest latitudes reached the dredgings consisted mainly of fragments of diorites, granites, mica schists, sandstones, limestones, and earthy shales. In the reports of the expeditions previous to those of the Dun dee and Norwegian whalers the rocks of the islands to the south of cape Horn are described as of volcanic origin. Dr Bruce, of the Balxna, reports the finding of metamorphic and sedimentary rocks in his soundings. Captain Larsen, of the ship Jason, as above stated, collected from Seymour island during his first trip, in 1892, a number of fossils which have been determined as belonging to the lower tertiary. In November of.the next year he landed on the same island, but at a different place, and says: When we were a quarter of a Norwegian mile from shore and stood about 300 feet above the sea the petrified wood became more and more frequent, and we took several specimens, which looked as if they were of deciduous trees; the bark and branches, as also the year rings, were seen in the logs which lay slanting in the soil. The wood seemed not to have been thrown out of the water; on the contrary, it could never have been in the water, because, in the first case, we found petrified worms, while there were none in the second. At other places we saw balls made of sand and cement resting upon pillars composed of the same constituents. . The beach is flat and consists of white sand. It would seem, therefore, that Antarctica was a true conti nental area, having the fundamental continental gneiss, with later fossil-bearing sandstones and limestone. The primary object of Ross's expedition was for the purpose of making magnetic observations, and in this he was very suc cessful, sailing to within 160 miles of the south magnetic pole. He furnished more trustworthy evidence on the meteorological and magnetic conditions of Antarctica than all the preceding and succeeding expeditions put together. At the time of the reading by Dr Murray of his valuable paper before the Royal Geographical Society, Dr Neumayer, a German scientist, contributed an article showing the desirability, even the 222
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