The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1876-12-14

overshadOwed them III gloom, and the
sun was seen no more for even short
half hour above the southern horizon, the
men began to ponder, and to be alarmed,
and to dream dreams. The crew of the
Alert envied the crew of the Discovery
they at least were near the open sea and
safety. The seamen of the Discovery, on
the other hand, believed that their COM
rades on the Alert had perished 10 man.
Besides on the bleak hillside near the
ship was there not a cairn and grave?
And was there not tablet--a "head.
stone," the men called it-on the board
to be erected over Captain Halls lonely
resting place, when the sun should again
fling his rays athwart the dreadfully en-
during darkness? Then there was the
mystery of poor Halls fate. Was he
poisoned, or did he commit suicide? Or
did his heart fail him as their hearts had
already failed them, or did he die heart
broken in consequences?
Then there were the early Dutch ships
spoken of by Darlington aud Beaufoy,
Fellows of the Royal Society of England,
who had reached within two or three de.
grees of the pole, and of finding there an
open sea and destruction-all except one
man miraculously saved by walrus.-
And there was record Of another Dutch
ship going down two degrees beyond the
pole recorded by the late Admiral Fitz-
roy before the Geographical Society Of
London, in April, 1865. The Esquimaux
who had seen the ship enter the sea, and
another band of Esquimaux who had
seen her on the Asiatic side, agreed, the
Admiral said, in declaring the disappear
ance of the daring navigator.
The Esquimaux on Smiths Sound, or
rather on the mountain, 1000 feet high,
re-discovered by Lieutenant AIdrich in
latitude SO deg, min., saw the vessel
steer through an open channel and enter
the mild open sea. At first she answered
her helm, but as she sailed northward she
DETECTED considerably from the normal
route. Finally, like dancing dervish,
she began to whirl round the outer run
of the irresistible eddy, like ii mad ship
in an ocean circus. mo doubt" said
the Admiral, this is correct description
of the event, if it ever happened. Every
fresh circle of that sea will whirl ship
faster than the preceding. Faster and
faster will they be driven; round and
round will they 60, till at last they
plunge bow foremost into the central
abyss, crashing amid the wreck of ice
bergs and the bleached skeletons of ma
rine monsters"
With minds stored with such cheerful
details and enlivening traditions as the
foregoing, Commander Markham, Lieu
tenant Parr and the fully equipped sledge
parties started on their bleak journey
northward when spring came. The men
were den,ralized by superstitious fears,
the two officers in command were dis.
couraged. They progressed little more
than a mile n day. Their track had to
be hewn through the up-reared ridges of
ice with pick-axes. They labored be-
tween sixty and seventy days, and on the
18th of May reached the highest latitude
attained by any modern expedition-that
of SO deg, 20 min, 26 sec. north, or with
in four hundred miles of the mystery of
the pole. They lacked the courage to
penetrate that mystery, and Captain
Mares and his discomftted command find
it convenient to assert that there is no
open Polar Sea. At the same time
scientists and nayigators in both conti-
nents unite in pronouncing Captain
Mares mistaken and his expedition fail
ure. But none of his wealthy denouncers
exhibit any alacrity to lead the way to
the pole to hoist their country's flag
there. For every recently recorded fact
proved the existence not of q "Sea Of
Ancient Ice"-'the Paleocrystic or Pal
eortic Sea-" but whirlpool sea, whose
borders are mingled by varying masses
of gigantic icebergs centuries old. There
are secrets of nature which man it would
appear, is no: destined to unlock. The
pole and the aurora boreas seem to be-
long to these. The mystery is like that
of the life eternal it can only be solved
by Welding up the life present.