The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1878-09-28 00:00:00

THE NEXT ARCTIC EXPEDITION.

The Jeannette, one of the two vessels with which
Mr. James Gordon Bennett hopes to reach the North
Pole, has sailed for San Francisco, where her
equipment will be completed and from whence she is
to set out early in the new year, under the command
of Captain Allan Young. The ship and her captain
have both seen service in Aret‘c circles, and every.
thing connected with this spirited undertaking seems
to afford reasonable ground for the hope which, of
course, Mr.- Bennett entertains that the honour of
reaching the North Pole is in store for the New
York, Herald and the American nation. If money
and foresight and plucky effort could command
success, no doubt next year would witness the
achievement of a feat which has baffled every effort
for four hundred years past. Nothing seems to have
been spared in the way of adaptation of the ship, or in the
way of appliances which modern experience has shown
to be of service, and the Jeannette will probably set out
on her perilous voyage next January as thoroughly
equipped for success as she would be if it Were the
undertaking of the whole American people instead
of a private speculation. It is not in mortals to
command success, however, and Mr. Bennett will
require a little of that luck which attended the search
for Livingstone, undertaken by Mr. Stanley at his
instance, to supplement his preparations if the
expedition of the Jeannette and the Dauntless are
not to figure in the list of failures that has already
attained such a portentous length. The Jeannette is
to push towards the pole by way of I3ehring Straits,
and the Dauntless will make a. simultaneous effort to
attain the goal by way of Spitzbergen, the latter, it
will be remembered, being the route upon which
Franklin perished more than thirty years ago. The
last attempt in this direction was made in 1849. The
way by Behring Straits seems to be regarded with the
greater hopefulness of the two, one important fact
being that by this channel the explorers will have the
full benefit of the current which runs northwards,
whereas in Smith's Sound the course of the current is
all against a vessel passing to the north. Being the
most westerly passage also, and the prevailing wind
being the north-west, the ice is apt to drive east.
wards, and thus it is hoped that a passage will be
found to windward of the ice.—Globe.

Sir M. Hicks Beach was present at an agricultural
dinner on Tuesday evening at Moreten•in-the-s,larsh, and
conidn reply to the toast "The
eninea the present excess of
Rousespoke aotf ccooomsimd eorna.b.l„e luenegth
talk in that assembly, and hoped that some means would be
found of checking it, so that business might be better done.
The principal portion of his speech, however, referred to the
colonies, and he praised them for the attitude they had
shown in support of the mother country during the recent
crisis, thereby falsifying the predictions of those who thought
that in the event of a European war the collni,ts would take
the opportunity of separating themselves from England. He
also expressed a hope that when a general election came
the country would show that it was satisfied with what had
Inen achieved by the present Cloverniuent,