Mineral Point tribune. (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1869-1938, 1876-11-10
m. LAST POLAR EXPEDITION.

The British Arcllc 6pcultIOu uoo
returned, having failed, as has every
other of the numerous expeditions
that within the past two centuries
has been sent out to make the long,
sonrht Northwest Passage from the
Atlantic to the Pacific. The vessels
that went out upon this expedition
the Alert andthe Discovery-were by
all odds the staunchest and best
o,n;pped that ever sailed for the
Arctic seas on voyage of discovery.
Roth were steamers Of the most APP
proved model, and equipped so as
not to be dependent upon contin-
concies of wind and tide. They
fitted with every contrivance that
ingenuity and experience could sug-
cest and money buy to provide for
the comfort and safety of those on
board. Besides being loaded down
with supplies, they were accom-
panied by third ship, with full
cargo of supplies, which was dis
charged at Disco, where depot was
established. The expedition was
under command of Capt. Mares, one
Of the best officers in the British
navy, and an experienced Arctic
navigator. The crews were selected
from among large number of men
who had sailed the Arctic seas, and
back of all was the British Govern
ment ready to do all that could be
done 70 insure the success Of the
expedition it sent out.
The expedition sailed from Ports
mouth on the 10Th of May, 1878,
with the expectation that during the
summer of that year the Alert and
her consort would steam to the pole.
But with all the resources at his
command and concentrating these
upon one vessel, the Alert, Capt.
Mares found it impossible to pene-
trate further north than the SD
parallel. From there detachment
was dispatched northward over the
ice hy siedges. But such were the
obstacles encountered that in seventy
days they succeeded in penetrating
one degree and twenty minutes
further northward, though travelling
200 miles to accomplish it, when
they reached S3 deg. 20 min. north
and were within 400 miles of the
pole. They found ice $50 feet thick
tire temperature for fortnight was
80 below once it fell to lO4 below
the freezing point, being the most
Intense cold ever experienced 10y
human beings,-at least 10y any who
lived to report the fact. There were
times when the sledge party could
not advance one mile per day
through the towering walls formed
by the tapping of the great ice
lodges. TAe suileliugs OF this party
were intense. Peterson, the inter-
prefer, died from frost-bite Three
others died on the sledging eXpedi-
ton, andithe survivors who reached
the ship, after terrible suffering,
returned only to report the impossi-
sibility OF reaching the pole or Of
working the Northwest Passage.
The expedition settles that there is
no open polar sea, that President
Land, laid down upon the maps OF
Capt. Hall, does not exist, and that
the Northwest Passage does not
exist.
The expedition passed beyond the
verge of animal life. In those icy
solitudes was neither bird nor beast,
not even the polar bear, nor the
Arctic fox, nor the seal, were to be
found, While they were far beyond
any tribe of the Esquimaux. Yet
there were discovered coal fields,
showing individually that in the vast
cycles Of the past, so many years
ago that the imagination can scarce
comprehend it, the temperature there
was warm enough, from the earth's
internal fires, for century upon CEN
turies growth of the ferns, which IN
other great cycles were transformed
into coal. The chief result Of the
expedition, however, is to demon
s!rate that the open Polar Sea. and
the Polar Continent, and the North
west Passage are myths and that
the periling of life in bootless Arctic
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