DISCOVERIES IN A NEW WORLD OF ICE
(CONTINUED)
Before going south it was determined to examine a large bay to the
eastward for a possible opening into the Weddell Sea (Brialmont Bay).
The morning was foggy; but by noon the mist raised a little and we
found ourselves off a bold, black cliff (Cape von Sterneck), with an
altitude of about fifteen hundred feet, on a projecting point of land,
with a few islands to the north and one to the south of it. This bluff
forms the eastern headland to the entrance of what we later discovered
was a strait opening into the Pacific, (Belgica Strait). Passing within
a few miles of the shore we examined carefully the glacial wall which
everywhere offered a check to our passage eastward. The interior of
the land was covered with a cloud which did not lift during the day,
but the coastal edge was distinctly visible, and offered us excellent
opportunities for surveying.
During the night of the 24th we steamed leisurely across the channel
and in the morning we found ourselves under a clear sky before a series
of icy
walls from 60 to 150 feet in height. From the sloping snows over these
cliffs there was showered upon us a light which was perfectly dazzling
to the eye. We selected here two points, where the ice had been partly
melted, offering a footing and a place for making observations.
The boat which took us ashore was loaded with men and instruments:
Lecointe, with his nautical instruments; Danco, with his magnetic
outfit; Racovitza, with guns and knives and what not, to take specimens
of life; Arctowski, with his big hammer and dozens of bags for stones;
Amundsen and the writer with snowshoes and camera, and the sailors with
boat-hooks and guns to keep off and capture seals. If we had started
out to make a month’s siege on the new lands and life we could not
have been better supplied. The cove in which we landed (Harry Island)
was a slope of rounded ice-worn granite rocks, upon which Lecointe and
Danco fixed their tripods. Racovitza turned up the stones along the
shore where he found mysterious crawling things which he hailed with as
much delight as if he had found nuggets of gold. Amundsen remained in
the boat and sought to secure a few Weddell sea-leopards asleep on a
pan of ice, while Arctowski and I mounted the inland ice to study its
character.
[Illustration:
Brialmont Bay. Cape Murray.
Sunrise and Sunset, Together, over the Eastern Shore of Belgica
Strait.]
The view which we obtained from the upper slopes of the land-ice was
superb indeed. To the east was an island (Two Hummock Island) with
two bare hummocks about two thousand five hundred feet high, and from
these, expanding in every direction, was a bed of ice and snow many
hundred feet deep. Beyond this, just barely visible and about fifty
miles from our position, was the feeble snowy outline of the great
country (Dancoland) which offered us no hope for a passage eastward.
Scattered about in the channel were numerous icebergs with petrels on
their crests, as tenants. Near one of these rested the _Belgica_
as easy and as stationary as if at anchor. We were on an island; except
at the sea line, however, there was not the slightest indication of
land. Everything was buried under a weight of snow and ice, about five
hundred feet in thickness. There were dome-like elevations and some
irregularities, but all was cold, white and lifeless. To the west of
this island there was a canal with several arms offering excellent
harbour facilities, and beyond, apparently within a stone’s throw,
though really five miles off, was Liege Island with Mount Brugmann,
making the most glorious snowy landscape I ever saw.
Later in the day we followed this land northward and then proceeded
to our first landing-place. It was a clear, silvery day, with only
an occasional cloud rising out of the black waters of the north. The
temperature was close to the freezing point, but the air was calm and
dry. We were dressed in ordinary clothing, without overcoats, and
when engaged in rowing, or climbing, our jackets were removed. Even
lightly dressed, we perspired while trying to scale the cliffs of ice.
The water was a joy to behold. It was like a mill-pond. Easy ripples
deflected the sunbeams on the mirrored surface, and everywhere, on the
surface and under it, could be seen the soft whiteness of the land-ice
and the savage blackness of the _noonataks_. We kept the coast
within five miles on our port side; at this distance it presented a
scene such as one sees nowhere else in the world. There were in the
foreground a few rocks too steep for snow to rest upon, black except
on the north-eastern face, where a little moss added a flush of red
and green; in the background everything was loaded down by continental
ice. The inland ice, unlike that of Greenland, was irregular, and took
the general outline of the mountain ridge under it. There was in view,
for a distance of twenty miles, extending north-east and south-west, an
unbroken series of mountains and ice-walls.
[Illustration: View Eastward from Neumayer Channel.
Part of Wiencke Island. Sierre Du Fief in the Background.]
[Illustration: Brooklyn Island.]
We spent the afternoon surveying this coast, and at 5 o’clock we were
off the rounded peak (Mount Allo) which we first saw on the 23d. We
then steamed again for the little island (Auguste) upon which we made
our first debarkment. Here we rested under steam for the few hours of
twilight, during the midnight hours, and on the 26th a number of sights
were made for triangulation. The morning of the 27th was spent in a
similar way. In the afternoon we steamed south to a number of small
rocks (Gaston Islands), which we thought might be the islands laid down
by Larsen on the east coast. Larsen claimed to have looked northward
from his islands without seeing land, but we found it otherwise. The
day was hazy, and, though the ice-wall of the coast was constantly
visible, the interior of the country to both sides of us was obscured
under clouds. A debarkment was made on one of the supposed Larsen
Islands. They were three in number, of irregular shape and in size;
the largest was not more than a mile in its longest diameter. The two
largest islands had, in the centre, cone-like peaks of bare rocks, from
which an ice-mantle spread out to the shore line, as it does on all
the antarctic islands. The smallest one upon which we landed was not
more than a half mile wide and three quarters of a mile long. There was
about it nothing to indicate land except a shelf of volcanic rocks upon
which we placed the geologist with his hammer, while the boat withdrew
to keep from being dashed to pieces on the rocks. The tide was low,
and if Arctowski had been left there, or if our boat had been lost, we
should have been forced to climb a vertical cliff of ice one hundred
feet high, or take to the rising sea of ice-water, as did the seals and
penguins. Neither prospect seemed agreeable, and the danger of falling
ice from the cliffs was such that we soon returned to the ship. The
haze of the morning thickened to a dense fog, which entirely blocked
out our view of the main shore-lines on both sides. We steamed westerly
in a line over which the channel seemed to open into a large body of
water.
The prevailing query on board was, “Is this the Pacific or the
Atlantic?”
The weather continuing foggy, we took advantage of the time to augment
our water supply. Up to this time we had made eight debarkments, but
found no place where fresh water could be taken. There were about us a
large number of icebergs. One of these offered an even side as a dock,
and to this we attempted to anchor the _Belgica_ that we might
secure ice from it, which could be melted and put into our tanks.
The ship was taken to the side, while men with ice anchors and axes
mounted to the berg. The men succeeded in placing the anchors, and also
chopped a supply of ice; but the motion of the berg was such that it
nearly stove in the ribs of the vessel in the effort to load. We were
compelled to cast off and leave the unruly berg. A few days later,
however, we found a small glacial stream from which we secured a good
supply of water, which served us for several months.
Being still unwilling to advance into the unknown region before us
while enshrouded in mist, we drew near a prominent mountain peak (Cape
Anna), whose front was perpendicular and free of snow to the seashore.
This peak was, as we learned on the following day, one of a number
extending far into the south-west. We made a debarkment at its base.
Here was life in profusion, as indeed it was on every rock where life
could gain a footing. The noise from the birds which re-echoed from
cliff to cliff was so deafening that our attempts at conversation
were inaudible. The lower rocks were lined with snoring and grunting
sea-leopards. Columns of vapour rose above the water followed by a
hiss like that of a steam-engine, and a second later the blue back of
a whale, with its long fin and ponderous tail, lashed the water into
a foamy whirlpool. The great wall of land-ice, which rose to each
side of the black cliff, gave us a shelf as a landing-place, and from
this wall came frequent sounds like the explosion of a cannon, each
followed by a great splash and a commotion in the water. With such
reports, parts of the wall would constantly break away and explode into
a million pieces, strewing the water with small fragments of ice, but
not with icebergs. Above us rose a cliff to an altitude of about two
thousand feet; out from this were projecting mantel-like rocks, which
served as resting-places for cormorants and sea-gulls. Here the young
ones, dressed in gray down, coaxed their mothers for food. We expected
to see the little things drop from the narrow resting-places to be
destroyed on our heads or on the rocks below, but such an accident
rarely happened. Our greatest surprise here was the discovery of large
quantities of moss and lichens, which gave the spot an appearance of
life that to us, after having seen nothing but ice and black rocks for
so many days, made it a true oasis.
From this point we were able to see in a splendid manner almost the
entire length of the channel explored to this time; but we had not yet
been able to make a running survey of the regions in our immediate
vicinity. To get a better view it was decided to ascend to the interior
of the land and scale one of the _noonataks_. In a bay (Buls
Bay) to the westward the land offered an easy slope and to it we
steamed on the following day. In our preparations for this ascent we
made arrangements to camp on the inland ice for a week. A tent was
taken, sleeping bags, and fur clothing were gotten out, and bags of
provisions were packed, all of which was lashed on two small sledges.
Volunteers were called for and those who responded were Arctowski,
Danco, Amundsen, and the writer. Led by Gerlache we landed late on the
afternoon of the 31st on a little point of land (Cape d’Ursel) with a
northern or sunny face. We climbed the steep slopes for five hundred
feet, and then camped for the night. The first night was one of stormy
discomfort. A wind came out of the bed of a glacier above us, against
which we could hardly stand. It took two men to hold up the tent, and
the combined efforts of all hands to keep from having our effects
scattered over the cliffs but a few yards away. On the 1st of February
we made another effort and mounted a few miles into the interior, but
fog and wind and crevasses made frequent halts necessary. The sledges
were heavily loaded and were difficult to drag, and altogether the work
of travelling and the discomfort of camping were such that the life was
generally miserable. We succeeded, however, in mounting to the peak
of a _noonatak_, with an altitude of about fifteen hundred feet,
and from there Gerlache and Danco were able to get the observations
necessary for the rough survey of our surroundings. The view before us
was even more beautiful, if possible, than anything we had seen since
our first entrance into this new white world. To the south-west there
was an opening through a new land and into a new sea, which remained
for us to explore later. To the north-east, descending into the white
airy distance, were the two high banks of the new highway. Before
us was a small island, shaped like a biscuit, and like everything
antarctic, it was covered with ice to the water’s edge. Around this
berg-like island were a number of icebergs, stranded on submerged
rocks, and these, by occasional mysterious explosions, sent up the
noise and the commotion of a thousand cannons. The opposite shore
here retreated, making two large bays. In these bays were a number
of islands, beyond which we could see clearly a narrow canal. The
land which spread out under the southern and eastern skies offered no
promise of a passage eastward; it had a series of black cliffs parallel
to the coast about five miles beyond the edge of the sea, and beyond
these the white outline of the land rose into the clouds.
[Illustration:
Lemaire Channel. Wandel Island.]
[Illustration: Cape Cloos.]
After a stay of seven days, which was our first camping experience in
the antarctic, and the first in the history of south polar exploration,
we gladly betook ourselves to the good old bark, which had returned
from a cruise southward. During our absence the _Belgica_, under
Lecointe’s direction, had been on an exploring cruise to the south. The
effort was brilliantly successful, for Lecointe reported the discovery
of several islands, upon one of which Racovitza had discovered the
metropolis of Belgica Strait, a city of forty thousand penguins, and
beyond these islands there was what promised to be an unobstructed
highway into the Pacific. To examine this and the extension of the
waters before us was our next mission; but Lecointe was not yet
satisfied that the wide bay opposite our encampment (Wilhelmina Bay),
did not extend through Dancoland to the Atlantic. During the night of
February 6th we steamed across the Strait, and early on the following
morning we were off Cape Murray. Keeping close to the shores we
followed the great wall of ice which lined the shore-line from Cape
Murray to Cape Reclus. At noon we rounded Cape Reclus, a long tongue
of land-ice with a saddle-shaped mountain in the center, and entered a
canal-like body of water, with the high ice-walls of Dancoland on the
east and the shore lines of Nansen and Brooklyn Islands on the west.
This was certainly a fairy-like scene; but a heavy fog settled down
over us, blocking out, for a time, the savage peaks which pierced the
heavy spread of snow and reared their towering heights far into the
dull skies. In this fog the water had the colour and the glimmer of
polished silver, while the walls of ice rising from the shore-lines
stood out in great lines of ultramarine blue. We continued our search
along the mainland, and in the evening we found ourselves opposite
Sophie Rocks, which we had seen from the other side. The body of water
through which we sailed on this day has been given the name “Chenal de
la Plata,” in honour of the capital of the Argentine Republic.
A scene which I photographed at midnight on February 7th pictures
this land in a faithful manner. The sun was just under the land-ice,
painting the sky in orange and the land in gold, while gliding
northward behind a great crested peak 4,000 feet in height. To each
side of this black peak were rugged edges of stratified rocks which had
once been under the sea, but were now raised to an elevation of two
thousand feet, and buried under a sheet of ice of more than a thousand
feet in thickness.
[Illustration: Ascending Icy Mountains.]
[Illustration: An Encampment.]
On the morning of February 8th we had completed a rough survey of
the mainland eastward, and a running survey of the eastern banks of
the Liege and Brabant Islands. We did not follow the channels leading
northward and westward, nor did we prolong our examination of the
lands in that direction beyond the banks of Belgica Strait. We steamed
around Cape Anna, and then headed for a remarkable cliff, at the base
of which we made our fourteenth debarkment. The day was a delight. The
sun showered its full wealth of rays on the sloping snows with such
force that the reflected beams made the air and the water perfectly
dazzling. It was a photographic day. As the ship steamed rapidly along,
spreading out one panorama after another of a new world, the noise of
the camera was as regular and successive as the tap of a stock ticker.
Not less than three hundred photographs were taken on this day. Surely,
in the hundred miles of land which we discovered on this memorable day
there were no landmarks which were not on our plates. Everybody was
on deck with pencil and paper, some making nautical and geographical
notes, others geological and topographical notes, and all recording the
strange other-world scenic effects. Even the sailors, the cabin-boy,
and the cooks were out with paper and note-books, taking long looks and
then bending over their paper.
The landscape was not materially different from what it had been along
the scores of miles which we had discovered during the days previous,
but the clearness of the atmosphere made it possible to see to the
limit of every point of the horizon. There were on this day many
notable sights, but I shall mention only two. Early in the afternoon we
saw on the northern side of the channel a great red cliff of granite.
Its bare face was only about one thousand feet high, but, with its
snow-covered base and its icy crest, it stood up boldly to an altitude
of three thousand feet against the clouds, which now came from the
south-west. A little farther south the channel was divided into two
arms by an island, with a bold round rock as a headland (Cape Eivind
Astrup). We took the western arm. This passage was not more than from
two to five miles in width, and its length was about forty miles. We
entered it at four o’clock, and steamed for six hours in a silvery
fjord, whose walls of ice and rock rose over us to a height of from
three to four thousand feet. At ten o’clock we saw the black sky of the
Pacific and the terminating banks of the newly discovered Strait.
Here, within sight of the Pacific, was a large bay (Borgen Bay)
surrounded by mountains (Osterrieth Mountains) fully three thousand
feet high and covered with snow to their summits. In this bay we rested
for the night.
The morning of the 9th was as beautiful as the day previous, and under
the warm rays of the sun we made two debarkments to fix the position
of the landmarks of the southern opening of the new Strait, and to
make the usual scientific collections and observations. The time from
the 9th to the 12th was spent in exploring this region. The country
was somewhat higher than any we had seen farther northward. Glacial
discharge had a greater tendency to be sent out by tongues into the
sea. The northern cape (Cape Lancaster) has a long tongue of ice rising
with an easy slope to a single mountain of moderate height. This agrees
well in position with the Mount William of Biscoe. The southern cape
(Cape Reynard) is made prominent by a number of needle-like peaks,
which are too steep to offer a resting-place for snow. Between these
two prominent capes is a large island (Wiencke Island), which has
running through its center a ridge of high peaks (Sierra Du Fief),
nearly free of snow. The northern point of Wiencke Island is a black
bluff crowned with an even sheet of ice which breaks off into the water
to both sides of the cape. This point has been named in honor of the
faithful companion of Lieutenant Peary, the friend of Mr. Amundsen and
myself, Eivind Astrup (now deceased). The southern cape (Cape Errera)
is remarkable, because upon it is a unique pyramidal peak. Just beyond
the southern termination of Wiencke Island there are a number of small
ice-capped islands (Wauwermans Islands).
In the past three weeks we have been remarkably successful in
discovering new regions. Without encountering any serious difficulty
we have passed through a new highway from Bransfield Strait, two
hundred miles south-westerly, through an unknown land to the Pacific,
which has been given the name “Detroit de la Belgica.” This highway
is perfectly free, in summer, for ordinary navigation. The scores of
new islands which dot the virgin waters are inhabited by countless
millions of penguins and cormorants, while great numbers of seals are
in evidence on every accessible rock or ledge of ice. In the waters
are large numbers of finback whales which, with the seals, will in the
near future offer a new industry. To the west of Belgica Strait there
are four large mountainous islands (Liege, Brabant, Grand, and Anvers
Islands). These islands are probably guarded seaward by a great number
of small islands. Over this group we have written the American name,
Palmer Archipelago, in justice to the young Yankee sealer, Nathaniel
Palmer, who first of all men saw the outer line of this still unknown
coast. The various islands, mountains, capes, bays, and headlands have
been named in honour of Belgian friends of the expedition. We have not,
however, forgotten prominent outside workers, as is clearly shown by
Neumayer Channel and Nansen Island. The honor of bestowing some names
fell to the lot of each officer. Two islands, which it has been my
privilege to name, are called Brooklyn and Van Wyck Islands; Brooklyn,
in honour of the city of my home, and Van Wyck, in honour of the first
Mayor of Greater New York.
To the east of Belgica Strait the shore-line is unbroken. It has
many deep indentations, but there is no passage into the Atlantic. A
continuous wall of ice, from fifty to one hundred feet high, fronts
the coast everywhere. This land is from two thousand to four thousand
feet high, with mountains farther inland perhaps six thousand feet in
altitude. Every valley and every surface which is not perpendicular is
buried by a sheet of never-melting ice. We were not able to follow the
coast of this country far enough south to determine the interesting
question whether it is continuous with Grahamland or not. This land
has received the name Terre de Danco, in memory of our late faithful
companion, Lieutenant Emile Danco.