THE ANTARCTIC OCEAN.
Comparative View of the Antarctic and Arctic Regions.--Inferiority
of Climate of the former.--Its Causes.--The New Shetland
Islands.--South Georgia.--The Peruvian Stream.--Sea-birds.--
The Giant Petrel.--The Albatross.--The Penguin.--The Austral
Whale.--The Hunchback.--The Fin-back.--The Grampus.--Battle
with a Whale.--The Sea-elephant.--The Southern Sea-bear.--The
Sea-leopard.--Antarctic Fishes.
The Antarctic regions are far more desolate and barren than the Arctic.
Here we have no energetic hunters, like the Esquimaux, chasing the seal
or the walrus; no herdsmen following, like the Samoïedes or the Lapps,
their reindeer to the brink of the icy ocean; but all is one dreary,
uninhabitable waste. While within the Arctic Circle the musk-ox enjoys
an abundance of food, and the lemming is still found thriving on the
bleakest islands, not a single land quadruped exists beyond 56° of
southern latitude.
Summer flowers gladden the sight of the Arctic navigator in the most
northern lands yet reached; but no plant of any description--not
even a moss or a lichen--has been observed beyond Cockburn Island in
64° 12´ S. lat.; and while even in Spitzbergen vegetation ascends the
mountain slopes to a height of 3000 feet the snow-line descends to the
water’s edge in every land within or near the Antarctic Circle.
An open sea, extending towards the northern pole as far as the eye
can reach, points out the path to future discovery; but the Antarctic
navigators, with one single exception, have invariably seen their
progress arrested by barriers of ice, and none have ever penetrated
beyond the comparatively low latitude of 78° 10´.
Even in Spitzbergen and East Greenland, Scoresby sometimes found the
heat of summer very great; but the annals of Antarctic navigation
invariably speak of a frigid temperature. In 1773, when Captain Phipps
visited Spitzbergen, the thermometer once rose to +58½°; and on July
15, 1820, when the “Hecla” left her winter-quarters in Melville Island
(74° 47´ N.), she enjoyed a warmth of +56°. But during the summer
months spent by Sir James Ross in the Antarctic Polar area, the
temperature of the air never once exceeded +41° 5´. In Northumberland
Sound (76° 42´ N.), probably the coldest spot hitherto visited in the
north, the mean of the three summer months was found to be +30° 8´,
while within the Antarctic Circle it only amounted to +27° 3´.
The reader may possibly wonder why the climate of the southern
polar regions is so much more severe than that of the high northern
latitudes; or why coasts and valleys, at equal distances from the
equator, should in one case be found green with vegetation, and in
another mere wastes of snow and ice; but the predominance of land in
the north, and of sea in the south, fully answers the question. Within
the Arctic Circle we see vast continental masses projecting far to
the north, so as to form an almost continuous belt round the icy sea;
while in the southern hemisphere, the continents taper down in a vast
extent of open ocean. In the north, the plains of Siberia and of the
Hudson’s Bay territories, warmed by the sunbeams of summer, become at
that season centres of radiating heat, so that in many parts the growth
of forests, or even the culture of the cereals, advances as high as 70°
of latitude; while the Antarctic lands are of a comparatively small
extent, and isolated in the midst of frigid waters, whose temperature
scarcely varies from +29° 2´ even in the height of summer. Mostly
situated within the Antarctic Circle, and constantly chilled by cold
sea-winds, they act at every season as refrigerators of the atmosphere.
In the north, the formation of icebergs is confined to a few
mountainous countries, such as the west coast of Greenland or
Spitzbergen; but the Antarctic coast-lands generally tower to a
considerable height above the level of the sea, and the vast fragments
which are constantly detaching themselves from their glaciers keep up
the low temperature of the seas.
In the north, the cold currents of the Polar Ocean, with their
drift-ice and bergs, have but the two wide gates of the Greenland Sea
and Davis’s Strait through which they can emerge to the south, so that
their influence is confined within comparatively narrow limits, while
the gelid streams of the Antarctic seas branch out freely on all sides,
and convey their floating ice-masses far and wide within the temperate
seas. It is only to the west of Newfoundland that single icebergs
have ever been known to descend as low as 39° of latitude; but in the
southern hemisphere they have been met with in the vicinity of the Cape
of Good Hope (35° S. lat.), near Tristan d’Acunha, opposite to the
mouth of the Rio de la Plata, and within a hundred leagues of Tasmania.
In the north, finally, we find the Gulf Stream conveying warmth even
to the shores of Spitzbergen and Nova Zembla; while in the opposite
regions of the globe, no traces of warm currents have been observed
beyond 55° of latitude.
Thus the predominance of vast tracts of flat land in the boreal
hemisphere, and of an immense expanse of ocean in the Antarctic
regions, sufficiently accounts for the æstival warmth of the former,
and the comparatively low summer temperature of the latter.
It is unnecessary to describe in detail each of the desolate lands
which modern navigators have discovered among the Antarctic ice-fields,
but it may not be uninteresting to compare one or two of these dreary
wastes with the lands of the north, situated in analogous latitudes.
The New Shetland Islands, situated between 61° and 63° of Southern
latitude, were originally discovered by Dirck Gheritz, a Dutch
navigator, who, in attempting to round Cape Horn, was carried by
tempestuous weather within sight of their mountainous coasts. Long
forgotten, they were re-discovered in 1819 by Mr. Smith, a master in
the royal navy--whom a storm had likewise carried thither--and in the
following year more accurately examined by Edward Bransfield, whose
name survives in the strait which separates them from D’Urville’s Louis
Philippe Land.
In 1829, the “Chanticleer,” Captain Forster, was sent to New Shetland
for the purpose of making magnetic and other physical observations, and
remained for several months at Deception Island, which was selected as
a station from its affording the best harbor in South Shetland.
Though these islands are situated at about the same distance from the
pole as the Faroe Islands which boast of numerous flocks of sheep, and
where the sea never freezes, yet, when the “Chanticleer” approached
Deception Island, on January 5 (a month corresponding to our July), so
many icebergs were scattered about, that Forster counted at one time
no fewer than eighty-one. A gale having arisen, accompanied by a thick
fog, great care was needed to avoid running foul of these floating
cliffs. After entering the harbor--a work of no slight difficulty,
from the violence of the wind--the fogs were so frequent that, for the
first ten days, neither sun nor stars were seen; and it was withal so
raw and cold, that Lieutenant Kendal, to whom we owe a short narrative
of the expedition, did not recollect having suffered more at any time
in the Arctic regions, even at the lowest range of the thermometer. In
this desolate land, frozen water becomes an integral portion of the
soil; for this volcanic island is composed chiefly of alternate layers
of ashes and ice, as if the snow of each winter, during a series of
years, had been prevented from melting in the following summer, by the
ejection of cinders and ashes from some part where volcanic action
still goes on. Early in March (the September of the north) the freezing
over of the cove in which the ship was secured gave warning that it was
high time for her to quit this desolate port. With much difficulty and
severe labor, from the fury of the gales, they managed to get away, and
we may fully credit Lieutenant Kendal’s assertion, that it was a day of
rejoicing to all on board when the shores of Deception faded from their
view.
In 1775 Cook, on his second voyage, discovered the large island
of South Georgia, situated in latitude 54° and 55°, a situation
corresponding to that of Scarborough or Durham. But what a difference
in the climate, for “we saw not a river or stream of water,” says the
great navigator, “on all the coast of Georgia. The head of the bay,
as well as two places on each side, was terminated by perpendicular
icebergs of considerable height. Pieces were continually breaking
off and floating out to sea, and a great fall happened while we were
in the bay, which made a noise like a cannon. The inner parts of the
country were not less savage and horrible. The wild rocks raised
their lofty summits till they were lost in the clouds, and the valley
lay covered with everlasting snow. Not a tree was to be seen, not a
shrub even big enough to make a toothpick. The only vegetation was a
coarse strong-bladed grass growing in tufts, wild burnet, and a plant
like moss, which sprang from the rocks. The lands, or rather rocks,
bordering on the sea-coast were not covered with snow like the inland
parts, but all the vegetation we could see on the clear places was the
grass above mentioned.” To find scenes of a similar wintry desolation,
we must travel in the north as far as Nova Zembla or Spitzbergen, which
are 20° or 24° nearer to the pole!
Thus the influence of the cold Antarctic waters extends far within the
temperate zone. We can trace their chilling effects in Kerguelen Land
(50° S. lat.), which when visited by Cook in the height of summer was
found covered with snow, and where only five plants in flower were
collected; in Tierra del Fuego (53° S. lat.), where the mean summer
temperature is fully 9½° lower than that of Dublin (53° 21´ N. lat.);
in the Falkland Islands (51° 30´), which, though flat and low and near
Patagonia, have, according to Mr. Darwin, a climate similar to that
which is experienced at the height of between one and two thousand feet
on the mountains of North Wales, with less sunshine and less frost, but
more wind and rain; and finally along the south-west coast of America,
where the Peruvian current and the cold sea-winds so considerably
depress the snow-line, that while in Europe the most southern glacier
which comes down to the sea is met with, according to Von Buch, on the
coast of Norway in lat. 67°; the “Beagle” found a glacier fifteen miles
long and in one part seven miles broad descending to the sea-coast in
the gulf of Penas, in a latitude (46° 50´) nearly corresponding with
that of the Lake of Geneva.
“The position of this glacier,” says Mr. Darwin, “may be put even in a
more striking point of view, for it descends to the sea-coast within
less than 9° from where palms grow; within 4½° of a region where the
jaguar and puma range over the plains, less than 2½° from arborescent
grasses, and (looking to the westward in the same hemisphere) less
than 2° from orchideous parasites, and within a single degree of
tree-ferns!” As the influence of the tropical gulf stream reaches as
far as Spitzbergen, so that of the cold Peruvian stream, which issues
from the Antarctic Seas, extends even to the equator, and not seldom
reduces the temperature of the waters about the Galapagos to less than
+58½°, so that reef-building corals, which require a minimum warmth of
+60°, are unable to grow near islands situated directly under the line.
Though the Antarctic lands are so bleak and inclement that not a single
quadruped is to be found within 60° of latitude, yet they are the
resort of innumerable sea-birds which, belonging to the same families
as those of the north, generally form distinct genera or species, for
with rare exceptions no bird is found to inhabit both the Arctic and
the Antarctic regions.
Thus in the petrel family we find the fulmar (_Procellaria glacialis_)
and the glacial petrel (_P. gelida_) of the high north represented in
the Antarctic Seas by the giant petrel (_Procellaria gigantea_), which
extends its flight from Patagonia to the ice-banks of the south, where
the Antarctic and the snowy petrels (_P. antarctica et nivea_) first
appear, cold-loving birds which never leave those dreary waters, and
are often seen in vast flocks floating upon the drift-ice.
The giant petrel, which has received from the Spaniards the significant
appellation of “_quebranta huesos_,” or “break-bones,” is a more
powerful bird than the fulmar. It is larger than a goose, with a strong
beak 4½ inches long. Its color is a dirty black, white below, and with
white spots on the neck and back. In its habits and manner of flight
it closely resembles the albatross, and, as with the albatross, a
spectator may watch it for hours together without seeing on what it
feeds. Like the fulmar it feasts upon fishes, or the carcasses of seals
and cetaceans, but it also chases other birds. At Port Saint Antonio
it was seen by some of the officers of the “Beagle” pursuing a diver,
which tried to escape by diving and flying, but was continually struck
down, and at last killed by a blow on its head. Such is its voracity
that it does not even spare its own kind, for a gigantic petrel having
been badly wounded by a shot from the “Terror,” and falling at too
great a distance for a boat to be sent after it, was immediately
attacked by two others of the same kind and torn to pieces. It is a
common bird both in the open sea and in the inland channels of Tierra
del Fuego, and the south-west coast of America.
The wandering albatross (_Diomedea exulans_), closely allied to the
petrels, and rivalling the condor in size and strength of wing, may
truly be ranked among the Antarctic birds, as it is seldom seen in a
lower latitude than 36°, and increases in numbers towards the south.
Freyssinet saw it most frequently between 55° and 59° S. lat., and it
probably knows no other limits than those of the Polar ice. It is found
in every meridian of this enormous zone, but the regions of storms--
the Cape of Good Hope and Cape Horn--are its favorite resorts. Here it
may frequently be seen in the full majesty of its flight.
The auks of the northern hemisphere are represented, in the austral
regions, by the penguins, who, as Buffon remarks, are the least
bird-like of all birds. Their small wing-stumps, covered with short
rigid scale-like feathers, are altogether incapable of raising the body
in the air, but serve as admirable paddles in the water, and on land as
fore feet, with whose help they so alertly scale the grassy cliffs that
they might easily be mistaken for quadrupeds. Their feet, like those of
the auks, are placed so far back that the body is quite upright when
the bird is standing on the ground, a position which renders their gait
uncommonly slow and awkward, but greatly facilitates their movements in
the water. When at sea and fishing, the penguin comes to the surface
for the purpose of breathing with such a spring, and dives again so
instantaneously, that at first sight no one can be sure that it is not
a fish leaping for sport. Other sea-birds generally keep a considerable
part of their body out of the water while swimming, but this is not
the case with the penguin, whose head alone appears above the surface,
and thus rowing at the same time with its wings and feet, it swims so
quickly that many fishes would fail to keep up with it. Sir James Ross
once saw two penguins paddling away a thousand miles from the nearest
land. Protected against the cold by a thick layer of fat and a warm
great-coat of feathers, it remains for months on the high seas, and
seeks land only in the summer for the purpose of breeding. At this
time it is found in vast numbers on the Falkland Islands, Kerguelen’s
Land, New Shetland, or wherever in the Antarctic Seas, perhaps even to
the pole itself, a convenient coast invites its stay. On Possession
Island, for instance, a desolate rock, discovered by Sir James Ross
in lat. 71° 56´, myriads of penguins covered the whole surface of the
land, along the ledges of the precipices, and even to the summit of
the hills. Undaunted by the presence of beings whom they had never
seen before, the birds vigorously attacked the British seamen as they
waded through their ranks, and pecked at them with their sharp beaks,
a reception which, together with their loud coarse notes, and the
insupportable stench of their guano, made our countrymen but too happy
to depart, after having loaded their boat with geological specimens and
penguins. There are several species of this singular bird. The largest
and rarest (_Aptenodytes Forsteri_) is generally found singly, while
the smaller species always associate in vast numbers. Several were
caught in lat. 77° by Sir James Ross and brought on board alive; indeed
it was a very difficult and a cruel operation to kill them, until
hydrocyanic acid was resorted to, of which a tablespoonful effectually
accomplished the purpose in less than a minute. These enormous birds
varied in weight from sixty to seventy-five pounds. They are remarkably
stupid, and allow a man to approach them so near as to strike them on
the head with a bludgeon, and sometimes, if knocked off the ice into
the water, they will almost immediately leap upon it again as if eager
for a fight, though without the smallest means either of offense or
defense. They were first discovered during Captain Cook’s voyage to
the Antarctic regions, but Sir James Ross was fortunate in bringing
the first perfect specimens to England, some of which were preserved
entire in casks of strong pickle, that the physiologist and comparative
anatomist might have an opportunity of thoroughly examining their
structure. The principal food of the great penguin consists of various
species of crustaceous animals, and in its stomach are frequently
found from two to ten pounds’ weight of pebbles, swallowed no doubt to
promote digestion. “Its capture,” says Sir James Ross, “afforded great
amusement to our people, for when alarmed and endeavoring to escape, it
makes its way over deep snow faster than they could follow it: by lying
down on its belly and impelling itself by its powerful feet, it slides
along upon the surface of the snow at a great pace, steadying itself by
extending its fin-like wings, which alternately touch the ground on the
side opposite to the propelling leg.”
[Illustration: 122. THE ALBATROSS.]
Though the Antarctic Seas possess neither the narwhal nor the morse,
they abound, perhaps even more than the Arctic waters, in whales,
dolphins, and seals, at least in the higher latitudes.
The austral smooth-backed whale (_Balæna australis_) differs from his
Greenland relative in many respects: the head is comparatively smaller,
being only about one-fourth of the total length, the mouth is broader,
the baleen shorter, the pectoral fins are larger and pointed, and the
color is almost totally black, the white on the lower surface being
confined to a small part of the abdomen. The skull is also differently
formed; and while the Greenland whale has only thirteen pairs of ribs,
the austral smooth-back has fifteen.
According to Mr. Bennett, the austral smooth-back seldom attains a
greater length than fifty feet; but as it yields on an average from
eighty to ninety barrels of oil, its capture amply rewards the whaler’s
trouble. Though met with in the highest latitudes, and roaming over
the whole extent of the Antarctic Seas, it resorts in spring to the
sheltered bays of New Zealand, Australia, Kerguelen’s Land, Chili, the
Falkland Islands, Algoa Bay, etc., for the purpose of bringing forth
its young. This of course makes its capture easier, but must at the
same time lead to its extirpation, or drive it to the most inaccessible
regions of the Polar Ocean. Even now the whale-fishery of the southern
seas, which twenty or thirty years ago employed hundreds of vessels,
has much diminished in importance: it is chiefly carried on by the
Americans, the French, and our Australian colonies, which have the
advantage of being more conveniently situated than the mother-country.
In the higher latitudes of the Antarctic zone the hunch-back and
fin-back whales abound; but as the former is meagre and hardly worth
the boiling, and the latter, like the rorquals of the north, dives
with such rapidity that he snaps the harpoon-line or drags the boat
along with him into the water, they are seldom hunted. Hence they
will most likely continue to prosper in their native seas, unless the
improved missiles recently introduced in the whale-fishery can be made
to conquer them. The hunch-back is distinguished by the great length
of his pectoral fins, which extend to full eighteen feet, while these
organs are comparatively small in the fin-back. A kind of broad-nosed
whale likewise makes its appearance in the Antarctic Seas, but it is
not yet determined whether all these fin-backed whales of the south are
distinct species from those of the Arctic waters. A circumstance which
seems to speak for their identity is that fin-backs are met with in the
intervening temperate and tropical seas, so that no limits appear to
have been set to their excursions.
The sperm whale, or cachalot, though partial to the equinoctial ocean,
is also found in the cold Antarctic waters. It was met with by Sir
James Ross among the icebergs in 63° 20´ S. lat.; and near Possession
Island (71° 50´ S. lat.), where the hunch-backs were so abundant that
thirty were counted at one time in various directions, and during the
whole day wherever the eyes turned their blasts were to be seen. A
few sperm whales were also distinguished among them by their peculiar
manner of blowing or spouting.
Among the dolphins of the Antarctic Ocean we find a species of grampus
no less formidable and voracious than that of the northern seas. On
January 20, 1840, the American ship “Peacock,” while cruising in the
Antarctic waters, witnessed a conflict between one of them and a
whale. The sea was perfectly smooth, so that the whole combat could be
distinctly seen. At first the whale was perceived at some distance from
the ship lashing the water into foam, and apparently making desperate
efforts to shake off some invisible enemy. On approaching, they found
that an enormous grampus had seized it with its jaws. The whale vainly
turned and twisted itself in every direction, and its blood tinged the
water far around. The grampus had evidently the advantage, and the
other whales, of which there were many in sight, instead of assisting
their comrade, seemed only intent on their own safety. The grampus had
a brown back, a white abdomen, and a large fin on its back. The speed
at which the monstrous animals shot through the water prevented the
Americans from witnessing the issue of the fight. The classical dolphin
of the ancients has been seen near the Cape of Good Hope, and most
likely wanders far to the south, as he is proverbial for his arrow-like
rapidity, and can easily traverse a couple of hundred miles in a single
day. In the Strait of Magellan and about Cape Horn are frequently seen
the _Delphinus superciliosus_, whose turned-up mouth-corners give his
countenance a peculiarly benevolent and friendly expression, belied by
his ravenous propensities, and the _Delphinus leucoramphus_, who, like
the bjeluga of the north, has no dorsal fin, and by the liveliness of
his movements emulates the classical dolphin of the Mediterranean.
The seal family plays a no less important part in the zoology of the
Antarctic Seas than in that of the northern waters. Here we find the
monstrous sea-elephant (_Macrorhinus elephantinus_), so called not
only from his size attaining a length of twenty-five feet, and a girth
at the largest part of the body of from fifteen to eighteen, but also
from the singular structure of his elongated nostrils, which hang
down when he is in a state of repose, but swell out to a proboscis a
foot long when he is enraged. This gives the animal a very formidable
appearance, which, along with his bellowing and his widely-gaping jaws
armed with tusk-like canines, might strike terror into the boldest
heart. But in reality the sea-elephant is a most defenseless creature,
for on land it moves its unwieldy carcass with the utmost difficulty,
and a single blow upon the snout with a club suffices to stretch it
lifeless on the ground. It used to be met with in considerable numbers
on all the flat shores or islands between 35° and 62° S. lat., but as
it yields a large quantity of excellent oil, and as its skin, though
merely covered with thick short bristles, is of some value from its
great strength and thickness, incessant persecution has greatly thinned
its ranks, and in some parts extirpated it. Thus Sir James Ross relates
that the sea-elephant and several other species of seals, which were
formerly in great abundance at Kerguelen’s Land, annually drew a number
of fishing-vessels to its shores. But at the time of his visit (1840),
after so many years of slaughter, they had quite deserted the place.
The flesh of the sea-elephant is black, and of an oily taste, but Anson
and his companions, after having been tossed about for several months
on a tempestuous sea and reduced to great distress by scurvy, relished
it at Juan Fernandez. The tongue is said to be a great delicacy.
As the soft jet-black fur of the young southern sea-bear
(_Arctocephalus falclandicus_) is no less valuable than that of its
northern relative, the eagerness with which it is pursued may easily
be imagined. Formerly vast herds of sea-bears used to resort every
summer to the New Shetland Islands, but soon after the rediscovery of
the group the American and English sealers made their appearance on its
desolate shores, and in the short time of four years extirpated the
ursine seals, thus destroying by wasteful destruction what might have
been a permanent source of profit.
The southern sea-lion (_Otaria jubata_) is a larger animal than his
northern namesake; and while the latter is furnished only with an
erect and curly hair-tuft at the neck, a complete mane flows round his
breast. The remainder of the tawny body is covered with short smooth
hairs or bristles. The sea-lioness, who is much smaller than her mate,
has no mane; and as she is of a darker color and has a differently
shaped head, is frequently mistaken for another species, and called
wolf, or _lobo_, by the inhabitants of the south-western coast of
America. The fore flippers of the sea-lion have the appearance of large
pieces of black tough leather, showing, instead of nails, slight horny
elevations; the hind fins, which are likewise black, have a closer
resemblance to feet, and the five toes are furnished with small nails.
It is a formidable-looking beast, particularly when full grown to a
length of ten feet and more. The sea-leopard (_Leptonyx Weddelli_),
which owes its name to its spotted skin, is peculiar to the southern
seas. This large seal is from eight to nine feet long; the hind feet
have no nails, and greatly resemble the tail of a fish.
The Antarctic seals, dolphins, and petrels chiefly prey upon a genus
of fish discovered at Kerguelen’s Land, and named Notothenia by Dr.
Richardson. These fish, which are of an elongated eel-like shape,
conceal themselves from the persecutions of their enemies in the small
cracks and cavities of the pack-ice, and were frequently noticed by
Sir James Ross when driven from shelter by the ship as it struck and
passed over their protecting pieces of ice. They in their turn live
upon the smaller cancri and limacinæ, and these again upon creatures of
a still more diminutive size, until finally the chain of created beings
terminates in the diatoms,[23] which are found filling these seas with
the minutest forms of organic life.