Hunt for the Southern Continent

On the second of his three great voyages, James Cook (1728-1779) took on the most frightening of all his challenges - to travel as far south as possible, to regions never before explored, in the hope of finding a new great continent which could be settled by the British. He found the continent - but it was horrifically different from what had been hoped for. Cook’s account of this expedition (1772-75) is the only one of his three voyages written by himself. This extract covers the period of Nov 1773 – Dec 1774.