DISCOVERY RELIEF EXPEDITION.

Press, Volume LX, Issue 11689, 16 September 1903, Page 8

DISCOVERY RELIEF EXPEDITION.

Touching the Antarctic Relief Expedition, the secretary of the Lyttelton Harbour Board (Air C. Hood Williams) telef replied yesterday to Air G. Laurenson, 1.H.R., as follows“ The Chairman is very anxious that Lyttelton should be made the return port. Could you ask the Premier to cable to the Admiralty to accede to this, or in the event of the Discovery being extricated, that, she be allowed to return to Lyttelton to enable her to complete her scientific observation in connection with the magnetic base established here.” AL Laurenson replied by telegraph last evening that the Premier was cabling as suggested. (special to “the tress.”) WELLINGTON, September 15. At the request of the Chairman of the Lyttelton Harbour Board, Air Laurenson to-night waited on the Premier, and asked him to cable to the Admiralty, urging that if the Discovery Relief Expedition could not start from New Zealand, it should at any rate make the New Zealand port its first port of call on the return. The reasons mentioned were the interest taken in the expedition in New Zealand, the fact that Lyttelton is 500 miles nearer the Antarctic than Hobart, and the existence of the magnetic observatory at Christchurch, where records have been taken in conjunction with the original expedition.