hang over extensive packs of ice,—a mistake which we had ourselves, on many occasions, to guard against, when appearances were so strong, for several days in succession, that few in either ship could be persuaded that it was not really land until we actually sailed over the spot. It being a fine moonlight night, we continued our course, with a light easterly wind, and before midnight gained the position of the eastern point of the supposed land, and shaped our course to the S.W. under moderate sail, along the mountain range.
At day-break, as we had a most extensive view March 16.in every direction, the sky and horizon being perfectly clear, the mast-heads of both ships were crowded with officers and men anxious to get the first glimpse of the anticipated shores, but neither mountains nor barrier were to be seen.
An "appearance of land" was, indeed, reported to me by Lieutenant Sibbald, the officer of the forenoon watch, at 10 a.m., but it was so feeble when I went to the mast-head, that I was quite unable to distinguish any thing but a dark misty appearance. It is inserted by him in the log-book as bearing from S.S.W. to S.W. by W., and being in the exact direction of Balleny Islands, which had been seen by us on the morning of the 4th, it is by no means impossible that he was right, although they must have been at a distance of between seventy and eighty miles. There is no mention of any appearance of land in the logbook of the Terror.
