Page:Polar Exploration - Bruce - 1911.djvu/194

Antarctic deep-sea deposits (Scotia Deep-Sea Deposits, by Dr. J. H. H. Pirie, Scot. Geog. Mag., Aug. 1905) furnish very strong evidence of the existence of a large continental land-mass around the South Pole. The chief research in this direction has been done by the Challenger, the Valdivia, the Belgica, the Gauss, the Antarctic, and the Scotia, and recently by the Pourquoi-pas?. From the results of these expeditions we find that between 40° S. and 55° S. there is a broad band of globigerina ooze, with patches here and there in deeper water, far from the land, of red clay. To the south of this band there is a band of diatom ooze to which reference is made in another place. This band forms a complete circle, generally speaking, between 55° S. and 60° S. We notice, however, that the band becomes very narrow in the Drake Strait, halfway between South America and Graham Land, where it stretches only between 58° and 60° S. On the other hand, it widens out very much to the south of South Africa, where the band stretches from about 44° S. to 60° S. To the east of this it appears to dip southward in the neighbourhood of Enderby Land, but otherwise the distribution is much as has been already described. It would be of immense interest to dwell at length upon this remarkable deep-sea deposit, which is the most characteristic deposit of the