About midnight we suddenly came to the end of a very highportion of the Barrier, and found as we followed round that wewere entering a wide shallow bay. This must have been the inletwhere Borchgrevink landed in 1900, but it had greatly changedsince that time. He describes the bay as being a fairly narrowinlet. On our way east in the Discovery in 1902 we passedan inlet somewhat similar, but we did not see the western end asit was obscured by fog at the time. There seemed to be no doubtthat the Barrier had broken away at the entrance of this bay orinlet, and so had made it much wider and less deep than it was inprevious years. About half a mile down the bay we reached fastice. It was now about half-past twelve at night, and thesoutherly sun shone in our faces. Our astonishment was great tosee beyond the six or seven miles of flat bay ice, which wasabout five or six feet thick, high rounded ice cliffs, withvalleys between, running in an almost east and west direction.About four miles to the south we saw the opening of a largevalley, but could not say where it led. Due south of us, andrising to a height of approximately eight hundred feet, weresteep and rounded cliffs, and behind them sharp peaks. Thesoutherly sun being low these heights threw shadows which, forsome time, had the appearance of bare rocks. Two dark patches inthe face of one of the further cliffs had also this appearance,but a careful observation taken with a telescope showed them tobe caverns. To the east rose a long snow slope which cut thehorizon at the height of about three hundred feet. It had everyappearance of ice-covered land, but we could not stop then tomake certain, for the heavy ice and bergs lying to the northwardof us were setting down into the bay, and I saw that if we werenot to be beset it would be necessary to get away at once. Allround us were numbers of great whales showing their dorsal finsas they occasionally sounded, and on the edge of the bay-ice halfa dozen Emperor penguins stood lazily observing us. We named thisplace the Bay of Whales, for it was a veritable playground forthese monsters.
All day long Killer whales in large numbers had been risingand blowing near the ice. They came right alongside the ship, andevery now and then we could see one rear itself on end and pokeits head over the ice-edge on the lookout for a seal. On oneoccasion we saw a seal suddenly shoot out of the water on to thefloe-edge and hurry into safety with almost incredible speed foran animal of such unwieldy proportions. It travelled at least aquarter of a mile over the firm ice before pausing for breath. Aminute or two later the cause of this extreme haste becameevident, for the huge sinister head of a Killer slowly reareditself out of the water and gazed round for its intended victim.We have never seen a seal captured by one of these monsters, butundoubtedly they must fall victims sometimes, for the Killer isalways hanging round the ice, poking his head up amongst theloose floes, and the manifest alarm of seals lying there, andtheir quick retreat to a more secure position away from the watercan only be explained as the struggle to escape from a knowndanger. There were many Adelie penguins about, and it was amusingto watch them forming up in line on the edge of the ice, and thendiving in turn into the sea, like swimmers in a handicap race. Acouple of minutes might elapse before they appeared again.
Bhm Monster Lab.epub
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