The daily morning journal and courier., 1902-06-10

Anfnrtic Circle
 Nowhere in the world at the level O
 the sea is there in such a short distance
 a difference in character so great as be
 tween the Fuegian Islands and the out
 posts of the Antarctic, the South Shet
 lands. Our Swedish expedition had its | last contact with civilization at Staater
 Island, few miles north of Cape Horn
 where the Argentine Government has
 erected a magnetic observatory to CO., 1 operate with the Antarctic expeditions during the year 1902. This observatory < being the base of operations, especially
 for the work of the Swedish expedition s in adjoining parts of the Antarctic, we
 had the greatest interest in paying it a visit before starting.
 The 9th of January we left the island,
 obtaining at the same time our last view for a long period of human dwell z ings, of green forests of an almost trop-
 ical luxuriance, and vivified by bright colored flowers, by parrots and hum { ming birds The weather was the finest
 possible; when passing the notorious
 fifties south from Cape Horn we had
 only a light wind and almost smooth
 sea, and during the whole of our cross ing of the Drake Strait no ice came in
 sight.
 What difference in only five days of
 slow sailing later than this. On the
 morning of the 11th all on board could know that we were in new world. The air was cold, and the water at the freez- ing point, but the land itself was hidden |. 1+ +lo for lifted and unveiled to our view in it's unsurpassed grandeur the first of the
 Antarctic lands to be seen. It was King
 George Island, in the chain of the South
 Shetlands.
 For years I had tried to arrive in my
 mind at an idea of the general aspect of the Antarctic regions, but never had I expected to find, so far north of the polar circle, anything so wonderfully desolate as that which I now beheld. The island is very mountainous and some of it's peaks attain a height of two or three thousand feet. Between those peaks there are broad valleys, and any where else in the world this island would show all the contrasts of a vary ing nature. But now one feature only is conspicuous. Up to the highest sum
 mits everything is covered with snow and ice. The valleys are filled by inn mense glaciers. connecting over the ridges with their neighbors, climbing the summits, and far more luXuriant than the vegetation of tropical forests. To the east or to the west there seems nowhere to be an outcrop of bare rock, and only at few places at the edge of the sea are there some bold pro- montories of steep cliffs. But all along the coast there are number of rocky islets, often low, but always of the boldest shape, and, in contrast with the main island, those islands are almost always completely free from snow. The whole scenery presents a type of a glaciated country, such as our own was at a remote period, az reat deal differ ent from Greenland, and probably also from the common view on the matter. For even in the furthest north there does not exist a land so overwhelmed by the snow as this island, situated in the latitude of Drontheim in the north.
 The first impression, then, was one of hopeless desolation, and I could not help thinking that if this was the first view 1t would not be easy to work for year or perhaps longer still further south. For many hours there was not a shore to be seen where landing could be ef- fected. Only at the extreme west of the island was there strip of low land. However, we did not stop there, but fol- lowed our way to another island, Nell son Island, where the name on the chart, Harmony Cove seemed to inti- mate that we should find a favorite landing place.
 And it was in fact a nice little place, far more inviting than one could ever expect after the first view of the land. The bare space was not very large and the snow was creeping down on all sides. But, notwithstanding this, on all spots possible there grew a not too poor vegetation of mosses, lichens and algae of many different species, anAAI was every moment wondering whether we should not find grass or even a Towering plant. On the knolls of moss there was a rich life of small insects, and even little beetle, the first ever found in the Antarctic, rewarded the work of the entomologst.
 But with all this no land in the Arctic can ever be compared with this in pow erty On the other hand, on suitable pldCeS tHeI6 IS He euOuSli, so ITCH even that 1t seems impossible it could ever be surpassed. But this life almost all depends upon the sea. The dredge and the net have unveiled to us a fauna so rich in numbers, so wonderfully varied in it's forms, that do not believe it Is paralleled in the Arctic, and even the specialists often stand wondering be- fore this new and unexpected life. Not only is the surface of the sea crowded by shrimps and other lower forms, but there also exists a richness of fish, some of which would probably in other parts of the world give rise to great industry. Now, all these animals in their turn provide food for other larger and higher forms Nowhere else are the swarms of wales, some of them | among the largest of their kind, nearly | so numerous as here: Even the seals | are crowded along every coast, and | everywhere in the ice pack. On the | shore where we landed they were count ed in hundreds, and they were so tame | that they allowed themselves to be | on the neck and the back
 But the most typical representative of | the Antarctic regions, the one that by | far outdistances the others in interest |