brought us to this spot, they, when combined with others, will enable philosophers to determine whether, as in the northern magnetic latitudes, there be two foci of greater magnetic intensity, or whether it be not confined to one spot in the Antarctic regions, and that not very distant from the southern magnetic pole, which I rather apprehend to be fact. The means of ascertaining this important question in magnetic science, however, are now abundantly provided, and its determination will probably prove to be one of the more interesting results of our observations.
We had now no other object to divert us from a direct course round Cape Horn to the Falkland Islands, where I proposed to pass the winter, and thoroughly repair our ships, in readiness to make a third attempt to carry our magnetic researches into a high southern latitude, when the proper season for that purpose should arrive.
Impelled by strong westerly gales, we generally ran from one hundred and twenty to one hundred and sixty miles daily, when the nights were so clear as to admit of our running, although much hindered by the bower anchor, which we were unable to remove. It was, however, washed away, by a heavy sea which struck the ship during a gale on the 18th (the palms being broken off and March 18.left sticking in the ship's side), after having been carried in that extraordinary position above five hundred miles.
During the 19th and 20th, it blew a violent