The daily morning journal and courier., 1901-02-16
SETS DISCOVERY 1S40.
OF ANTARCTIC CONTINENT BY 4
 NEW HATENER.

Prot. w. H. Brewer of Yale, Finds Error in Recorded Date of the Discovery of Wilkes Iand-Wns Discovered by Lieutenant EId, of New Haven-Me- morial Tablet In Grove Street ceme- tery Bears Erroneous Date.
 Professor William H. Brewer, in open ing the thirty fifth series of annual
 Sheffield lectures last evening with the
 subject "The Antarctic Regions" made
 some important disclosures in regard
 to the original discovery of what is call-
 ed the Antarctic Continent"
 This, the seventh and last continent
 of the world, which for several hundred
 rniles extends parallel to the Antarctic
 circle, offering an effectual barrier 10
 further navigation south, New Fta-
 vener had the honor of discovering Dy
 the name of Lieutenant Eld of the
 United States navy. The m emorial tab let to Lieutenant Eld which now stands on Laurel avenue in the Grove street
 cemetery, reads that he was born in New Haven in 1874, and died of yellow
 fever on board the U. s. s. Ohio in 1850.
 He was a member of the exploring ex-
 petition sent into the Antarctic re-
 gions by the United States govern
 nent In 1S38-42, under the command of
 Captain Wilkes,
 At 10 a. IT.. on January 16, 1889, so
 reads the tablet, Lieutenant Eld cried out 'I4and!" turning to Lieutenant
 Reynolds, who stood by, he pointed out the range of icebound cliffs along which the expedition afterward skirted for several hundred miles before it was compelled to turn back homeward. The peak which Eld first discovered was named Eld's peak, and peak adja- cent to 1t, was called Reynolds peak, in honor of the two men. The Antarctic continent which has never been pene- trated, goes by the name of Wilkes Land.
 The date of the tablet which reads: January 16, 1889, was first discovered to be erroneous by Professor Brewer, while he was preparing last evenings lecture. In looking through the ships log of the expedition Professor Brewer found in the confused mass of detail the true date to be January 16, 1s4O, thus settling the date of the discovery of this last world-continent one year later than it is recorded.
 The lecture last evening was of espec- ial interest in that the first and only photographic views that have ever been taken and come back from the Antarc- tic regions were displayed among the By the kindness of Fred erick A. Cook of Brooklyn, personal friend of Professor Brewer, who has been twice with Lieutenant Peary in the Arctic regions and in 1897 joined the Belgian expedition at Rio Janeiro on its way toward the south pole. Pro- lessor Brewer succeeded Thursday in getting the lantern slides of these splen- did photographs so that the audience last evening experienced an unusual treat.
 The illustrations were interspersed with graphic descriptions by Professor Brewer, who said that further ac- quaintance with this marvellous nolar region will open up vast fields for scien- tlfc inquiry among the fascinating problems which may be settled, being the location of magnetic fields that con- [roi the workings of the mariners con- pass, and especially the question which puzzles the geologists and naturalists of the resemblances between plants and animals of South America and those of the Asiatic archipelago It is hoped that the study of Antarctic fossils if we can ever get at them, will disclose m original land connection bv way of me Antarctic continent, between South america and the islands about New Zealand.