A low berg of shallow draught drove
down into the grinding pack and, smashing against two larger stranded
bergs, pushed them off the bank. The three went away together pell-
mell. We took shelter under the lee of a large stranded berg.
A blizzard from the east-north-east prevented us leaving the shelter
of the berg on the following day (Sunday, January 17). The weather was
clear, but the gale drove dense clouds of snow off the land and
obscured the coast-line most of the time. "The land, seen when the air
is clear, appears higher than we thought it yesterday; probably it
rises to 3000 ft. above the head of the glacier. Caird Coast, as I
have named it, connects Coats' Land, discovered by Bruce in 1904, with
Luitpold Land, discovered by Filchner in 1912. The northern part is
similar in character to Coats' Land. It is fronted by an undulating
barrier, the van of a mighty ice-sheet that is being forced outward
from the high interior of the Antarctic Continent and apparently is
sweeping over low hills, plains, and shallow seas as the great Arctic
ice-sheet once pressed over Northern Europe. The barrier surface, seen
from the sea, is of a faint golden brown colour. It terminates usually
in cliffs ranging from 10 to 300 ft. in height, but in a very few
places sweeps down level with the sea.
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