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Chap. IX.]
ANTARCTIC CONTINENT.
275
1841
Land, as they suppose, it follows that neither of them have the smallest claim whatever; although equal praise is due to them for their exertions and perseverance as if they had really been the discoverers, for at that time they could not have known that Balleny had been there the year before them.
There do not appear to me sufficient grounds to justify the assertion that the various patches of land recently discovered by the American, French, and English navigators on the verge of the Antarctic Circle unite to form a great southern continent. The continuity of the largest of these "Terre Adelie" of M. D'Urville has not been traced more than three hundred miles, Enderby's Land not exceeding two hundred miles: the others being mostly of inconsiderable extent, of somewhat uncertain determination, and with wide channels between them, would lead rather to the conclusion that they form a chain of islands. Let each nation therefore be contented with its due share, and lay claim only to the discovery of those portions which they were the first to behold. But if future navigators should prove those conjectures about a continent to be correct, then the discoveries of Biscoe in the brig Tula in January 1831, and those of Balleny in 1839, to which I have so fully referred, will set at rest all dispute as to which nation the honour justly belongs of the priority of discovery of any such continent between the meridians of 47° and 163° of east