ARCTIC AND ANTARCTIC.* Tars " two-decker " book, as the
author not inappropriately dubs the pair of ponderous volumes before us, is principally interest- ing on account of the comparison it affords between the Arctic and Antarctic experiences of a trained and enthusiastic observer of Polar phenomena. Dr. McCormick had already gained some familiarity with Arctic regions as assistant-surgeon of the Hecht,' in which Sir Edward Parry in 1827 attempted to reach the North Pole, when, in 1839, he was appointed surgeon and naturalist to the Erebus,' which with the Terror '—ships for ever famous in Polar story—formed Sir James Ross's cele- brated expedition to the Antarctic Seas. The assistant-surgeon to the 'Erebus' was the present distinguished Director of Kew,
• Voyages of Discovery in the Arctic and Antarctic Seas and Bound the World, de. By Deputy Inspector-General R. McCormick. R.N., F.R.C.S. 2 vols. With Maps and Illustrations. London : B. Low and Co. 113z4.
whose exhaustive work on Antarctic botany will always be admired as a classical record of scientific investigation.
Within the Arctic circle the tracts of land widen as the Pole is approached; and the Polar circle, lying within the 80th parallel of north latitude, is almost completely hemmed in by the European and American continents, of which the northern coasts border upon or extend within three-fourths of its circumference. In the southern hemisphere the reverse is thb case. At points nearly equidistant in longitude upon the thirtieth parallel of south latitude, the great continents of South America and Africa, and the sentinel Australian island of Tasmania, jut southwards in diminishing tracts of land, of which the most southerly, the continental outlier of Tierra del Fuego, hardly attains a parallel within ten degrees of the Antarctic circle. With these exceptions, and, with the exception of a few insignificant islands, it is "water, water everywhere" up to the Antarctic boundary, which is followed with curious closeness by the tracts known as Enderby Island and Graham Land, lying opposite the Cape of Good Hope and Cape Horn respectively, and by the northern coast of what is probably a vast polar continent, facing Tasmania and continuous with Victoria Land, where a deep bight allowed Ross to penetrate nearly to the 80th parallel. Thus, while the North Polar region is mainly a sea space, hemmed in by land, the South Polar region is mainly a land space, girdled by ice, and isolated in the midst of an almost landless ocean.
The South Polar region is actually in a 'state of glaciation. The southern winters are longer and the southern summers are shorter than the northern. In addition, during the southern winter the earth is in aphelion. The southern trade winds, in consequence, blow with greater force than the northern, often extending ten or fifteen degrees north of the Equator. Hence the warm water of the equatorial tract is impelled northwards rather than southwards. Further, no such boiler as the West Indian sea exists to create a Gulf Stream for the Southern Ocean. All these circumstances combine to induce an Ant- arctic climate that may be fairly described as glacial. During the glacial period Europe was covered by sheets of ice, often thousands of feet in thickness, as far south as the Riviera. In the Southern Ocean icebergs are not unfre- quently met with almost as far north as the latitude of the Cape of Good Hope, and Sir James Ross found the pack ice begin a little south of the 60th parallel. 'Were the proportion and, distribution of land in the higher lati- tudes of the southern such as obtain in those of the northern hemisphere, Patagonia, Tasmania, and possibly the southern- most portions of Africa and Australia, would be in a state of glaciation. The almost total absence of land, however, between 30° S. lat. and the Antarctic Circle causes a singular mildness of climate to reign over this immense belt. Even round the South Pole itself, it is possible that, though the summers are colder, the winters are somewhat less severe than at the other extremity of the earth's axis. In the Antarctic, as in the Arctic region, the ice is derived from the accu- mulations of snow on the land, and from the freezing of the shallower littoral waters. The Antarctic ice-cap, in constant movement under the variations of temperature that daily occur, slips slowly into the circumambient ocean ; and the precipitous wave-eaten walls, often three to four hundred feet high, of the immense mass oppose a terrible barrier, which in all likelihood will for ever remain impenetrable to human effort, —though it may perhaps be evaded by some adventurous aeronaut of the future being borne across it to hover over the south Pole itself. Of the anblimest and most distinctive feature of Antarctic scenery no pen, no pencil, can render the mingled horror and beauty with any approach to adequacy; but Dr. McCormick's descriptions and sketches will help the imagina- tive reader to form some conception of this most awe-striking of the wonders of the deep. The very ice of the barrier differs from that of the North Polar region. It is harder, heavier, purer. The bergs are tabular, not pinnaded, and are often of enormous extent, comprising hundreds, even thousands, of square miles. None of the artists on board the Challenger,' says Mr. Moseley in his interesting " Notes " (where an instructive life-history of Antarctic icebergs will be found), were able to approach the vivid and deep hues of ultramarine and azure blue they display, in bands, streaks, and mottled or marbled masses. Those alone who have watched these huge ice-islands loom spectre-like amid the soft hush of falling snow, or through driving fog or lifting mist, to drift menacingly by into the thick- ness that broods with infrequent intervals of brightness over Antarctic waters, or have seen them by hundreds sailing over an indigo sea and sparkling under a dazzling sun, displaying every shade of blue, from the delicatest ultramarine to the deepest cobalt, on a ground of pure dead or pellucid white, can feel the fateful mystery and weird beauty with which they are by turns invested. During the Antarctic summer the thermometer ranges between three and four degrees below freezing-point. Hence the brilliant vegetation characteristic of the Arctic summer is unknown in the Southern Polar tract. A stunted grass, Aira antaretlea, was found by Dr. Eights in the South Shetlands, and Sir J. D. Hooker gathered various lichens, algre, and mosses, in January, 1843, on the coast of Palmer's Land, the 'Ultima Thule of southern terrestrial plant-life. But these tracts are outside, though only just outside, the Antarctic Circle. Up to the edge of the pack ice, a large kind of kelp (macroeystis) and the gigantic alga, Lessonia, are common; and. the equable climate of the Kerguelen and Auckland belt allows of the existence of a luxuriant and conspicuously-flowered vege- tation—comprising asters, large blue veronicas, curious mistle- toes (myzodendron), &c.--on the islands that sparsely dot it front east to west. Round the edge of the ice hovers the beautiful white Antarctic petrel, while the sooty albatross and a species of skna are found nearly as high. These .birds do not inhabit the Arctic seas ; but whales, grampuses, and seals are abundant, and, together with certain low crustacea and an argonaut, form connecting life-links between both Polar regions. Within the ice-barrier itself the only signs of life seem to be the yellowish diatom-stains that the bergs occasionally display. There are no land animals whatever ; and no sounds but the roar of wind or storm, and the wide whisper of falling snow, with the occasional alarum-note of some detonating ice split, disturb the death-like stillness of the Antarctic continent.
Dr. McCormick, while making no literary pretensions, writes with the vividness of one who is thoroughly at home in his sub- ject. The description of the great Antarctic ice-barrier, over- soared by the huge cones of Mounts Erebus and Terror—the former still an active volcano—is, in especial, a graphic por- trayal of what perhaps is the sublimest scene the earth affords. His account of that most interesting island, Kerguelen Land, may be instructively compared with the one given by Mr. Moseley, who visited it nearly thirty years later. At Hobart Town, Dr. McCormick met Sir John Franklin, then Governor of Tasmania, who, five years afterwards, having discovered the North-West Passage while in command of the very ships, ' Erebus ' and Terror,' that formed Sir J. Ross's expedition, perished with both his crews, after having been compelled to abandon the ships, on the return journey. It was in connection with one of the many expeditions sent in search of Sir John Franklin that Dr. McCormick made his last Polar exploration, in command of a boat-party dispatched in 1852 to look for traces of Franklin in the Wellington Channel. An autobiography which closes the second volume was probably more interesting to write than it is to read. The numerous illustrations that adorn the book are extremely good, especially those of Antarctic scenery, which need only the characteristic blue tints to afford an excellent presentment of its singular beauty. We lay down the work with but one regret,—that its author, now in his eighty-fourth year, should believe himself, after so arduous and varied a naval service, to have met with insufficient consideration at the hands of his superiors.
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