A long winter night, with its intense darkness relieved at times by the light of the moon and brilliant chromatic displays of the aurora australis, succeeds a day of perpetual sunshine. All these are on such a scale of sublimity that no pen can adequately describe nor brush portray them. Nowhere else on the face of the globe does there exist such a wide expanse of utter desolation. Yet an undefined attraction lures bold men to fathom the mysteries of these forbidding regions. Dating from 1772, many exploring expeditions have visited the south polar regions in the interests of science. The compass is the mariner's guide across the trackless ocean, and it is essential to find out everything possible about that mysterious agent, magnetism, which directs the compass needle by its attractive force. The earth itself is a huge magnet with positive and negative poles. The poised needle of the compass maintains its relative position because of the magnetic poles of the earth, one located in the north polar regions, on the western side of the peninsula of Boothia, and the other in the south polar regions, on Victoria Land. Except in a few localities the compass needle does not point due north and south--that is, toward the real poles of the earth, but toward the magnetic poles. And these magnetic poles are ever shifting, as is shown by the changing direction of the compass needle, which year by year increases or decreases its deviation from true north and south. It is necessary to chart the variations of the magnetic needle for the use of the navigator. To observe the deviations and to locate the south magnetic pole have been the chief objects of south polar expeditions for several years, geographical information being of secondary importance. The marine life of the south polar regions is abundant. In the latter part of the eighteenth century ships sailing in the regions north of the antarctic circle discovered whales and fur-bearing seals. Soon sealers and whalers of different nations began to frequent the prolific new regions. Then various European nations and the United States sent out exploring expeditions to the south polar regions to gather scientific and geographical information as well as to assist the charting of coasts and the determination of magnetic variations.