The seventh continent; a history of the discovery and explorations of Antarctica (1918) (14741549826)

Identifier: seventhcontinent00wrig (find matches)
Title: The seventh continent; a history of the discovery and explorations of Antarctica
Year: 1918 (1910s)
Authors: Wright, Helen S. (Helen Saunders), b. 1874
Subjects:
Publisher: Boston, R.G. Badger
Contributing Library: The Library of Congress
Digitizing Sponsor: The Library of Congress



Text Appearing Before Image:
over its surface untilthat month, which corresponds with the Northern Aug-ust. * A circumstance, however, he continues, that is farmore objectionable to the Southern traveller than theextremity of temperature is the frequency of wind. Itis perhaps too broad a generalization to say that Arcticjourneys have usually been made under fine weatherconditions, but few, if any, Arctic travellers have beensubjected to the distressing frequency of blizzards andstrong winds that added so much to our discomfort inthe South. The geographical difference between the work of theNorthern and Southern sledge traveller is as great asthe climate, if not greater. ... To the South, it willbe seen that everywhere the explorers ship is broughtup by solid land or by some mighty wall resembling thatof the Great Ice Barrier; to pass beyond his ship there-fore, the explorer must either travel over land or overgreat and ancient snow-fields which possess a similarsurface. We have, therefore, this great geographical
Text Appearing After Image:
Captain Scott ^s Explorations 253 difference between the North and the South; the greaterpart of Northern travelling has been and will be doneon sea-ice, but the greater part of Southern travellinghas been and will be done over land surfaces, or what inthis respect are their equivalents. On travelling over the Great Barrier to the South,I was constantly impressed by recognizing the diffi-culties of surface so graphically described by Nansen inhis First Crossing of Greenland; and I came to the con-clusion that the conditions were very similar. But I wasstill more impressed by the obvious impossibility ofdragging a sledge over such a surface at the rate main-tained by the old English travellers on the Northernsea-ice. A general comparison of the sledging condi-tions met with in the North and in the South CEUinotbe said, therefore, to be in favour of the latter, and itmust be conceded that the Antarctic sledge travellerjourneys under considerable relative disadvantage; hehas to meet seve