The daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1873-1877, 1876-11-08
The g ailg Arsns,
ROCK ISLAND, ILLINOIS.
THE POLAR SEA.
highlands Attempt to Find it's Pole a
Fat Farce That Cost $3.50, 900.

Fat Farce That Cost S75o,ooo
| r.. /. Hayes in NeD York Herald
have always believed in the existence
of an open Polar sea. think | stood ur-
on its shores in 1861, | believe that sea
lnavigable, and am utterly at loss to
understand why the Alert and Discovery
did not sail upon its waters, unless we as
sumo that the spirit which animated
Baffin, Ross, Parry, and the long list of
Arctic heroes has died out with the ad
vance of steam, the telegraph. and home
this great English expedition really start
ed where | lett eff The north pole only
approached by some eighty miles nearer
ice was eighty feet thick. In plain Eng
lish ! don't believe it. and don't under
stand how it happened that grand expe-
dltion, fitted out with such great -four
lsh OF trumpets, at such enormous cost,
should have got frightened after one win
ter, and hurried home with the old cry
that the north pole can't be reached.
They did not stay there long enough to
prove it or tell anything about it. 10 be
sure, the matter Of getting to the north
pole is of little consequence in business
point of view. 1t may be of no conse
Quence whatever, but here is an expedi-
ton fitted out expressly to do it; has un-
limited time; has every possible advan-
tage; has the unqualified support of the
British government, and yet frightened
by one winters experience, hurries home
to report another failure The poaris did
better, for even after the death of poor
Capt. Hall it stuck until it was crushed BY
the ice. Had Capt Burlington been im-
bued with The same emotions as actuated
Capt. Hall, | believe he could have
steamed to the north pole, and | venture
to say that, whether the Alert could or
could not have gone there, one years ex-
periencc was not enough to prove it.
L am firm believer in an open Polar
sea. 1t is not sea available for the pur-
poses Of commerce, but it is certainly a
sea or ocean, as you may please to cali it.
W hatever interest attaches to it is of a
purely scientific character. 70 pursue
science requires patience, and to go with
a great government expedition, especially
to make scientific discoveries, with the
distinct understanding that there is no
other motive, seems to me to require
something more than simple 1T can t
be done. SO far as getting to the north
pole is concerned, am sure 1t can be done,
and in failing to do it after only one year S
trial, think the English expedition has
shown lamentable lack of English pluck.
0 They say they had dreadful time of it,
! some people were frozen and three or four
of them died. That was their own fault
Travelling in the Arctic regions is not
more terrible or more dangerous than
travelling anywhere else 1t is a matter
OF care and judgement. Accidents may
= happen, but it is the duty of commander
to see that they don't happen, | believe
have made as long a sledge Jour-
ney as any one on record. | experienced
a temperature during that journey of 10
degrees below zero, and yet there was
never in all the sixty days occupied by the
Tourney so much as frost bite to any OF
the party, and yet this was in the exact
. region where the English expedition has
been, finding, as they say, 50 feet of ice
The Polaris was In the same quarter and
o got nearly as far north.
The Polaris met with no such ice. but
met with the same evident decentralization
:. In my opinion there is no serious troubl,
I; about getting to the North pole, but
don't believe it can be done in one yea
= and may be not in two. and | must say
and that most emphatically, that the re
4 suits Of this last of the Artic expedition
are in no way commensurate with it
pretenso1s any more than they are witt
8 its opportunities Its like will never b
] seen again, and the chance for a gram
; achievement has been thrown away, /
10 short, the whole thing is failure withou
the explanatory clause I'VE stuck till th
last moment, aud did what we could
10 They had food and all manner of store
E for two years more, and should, in ID
Sc judgment, have stayed there until tnos
es stores were eaten up.
ke In the Arctlcs it is generally down to 2
III degrees, but even there it does not freez
IL unless the air is entirely calm, for waite
IL in motion does NOT freeze. | have see
waves rolling at so degrees below ger,
without a particle of ice In Sight. tt
next day, when the air fell to calm. til
whole sea was covered with a crystal mar
tie. The Arctic oceanis over 1000 mile
-. in diameter, and if anybody will once Q,
o over the land -clinging ice belt and into II
middle Of the Arctic sea he might sa
there TO his heart content, and |, for on
. cannot see why this English expedite
should Sc soon have abandoned the feel
3 There are certain avenues to this grea
mysterious, unknown water
There is the oft-tried Behring strai
their is Bafin bay, there is the Spitzbe
gen sea and the Greenland sea. In th
last quarter the Germans have found
new land. This land lies midway betwe,
Spitzbergen and Nova Zembla, which Ian
| predicted many years ago 10 an adore
before the American Geographic
society. 1t completes the almost contin
Gus line of land that invests the gre
Polar basin.
In conclusion allow me to say that tn
great English expedition from which
IS. much was expected looks very ike fare
The Pandora was sent out to carry letter
= which she left at Littletou island, ne
y. where | wintered in 1906 and, with t
best intentions in the world, discover
the great expedition, not where it "
nds expected to be, but IN mid ocean on
p0i way home. And now. after all, the gre
- object has not been attained. T
.--e scientific world and the curious of all G
- illzed nations are grievously disappointe
For once they were convinced that, sin
the British government had expended
best efforts and spent its means to t
extent of $750,000, we should have sol
positive knowledge as to what nature
busy with about the North pole.
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