Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1877-07-14
The Matter OF Arctic Explorations.


Editor o. Tbs Evening Sdr:-- In your paper
OF the 18th inst, you mention that Captain
Tyson, of the POlaris, has bought a vessel
and expects TO start on preli minary eNpe-
dition toward the North Pole, and you ex-
press yourselves very decidedly in opposi-
ton to "squaudering the money of the gov
eminent in further adventures OF this kind :"
quoting the respected editor of the journal
~ Commerce, as deduciLg authorifatively
from the experience of the Polaris the Tege-
thon, austrian and the late British expe-
ditlon, that 1.-The obstacles between LAT $50
and the pole are insuperable."
Without the slightest connection with the
enterprise OF Captain w. III Howgate, u. \.
A, for whom Tyson is acting, and with no
contlctt of the practicability OF reaching
resulting therefore, i submit one or two
statements which may be of interest at this
time.
This preliminary expedition, which sails
from New London in the Florence on the 10Th
instant expects To secure, / believe, Esqui-
maux guides and interpreters, az we'll as
IuTs, sledges, arc dog teams. These are for a
colony hereafter TO be established, which,
taking advantage of such an open season as
was found by Hall, may, by posting its relief
stations apd by sledging on 1.-THE west side"
accomplish what Hall was full of nope To do
when he returned TO the Polaris In health,
October oath, 1871, suddenly TO sicken and
die. In the narrative of the Polaris expedi-
ton, referred TO by the Journal Of Commerce.
you will find that Admiral Davis saws: ali
Hall had ca fried with him the strength aud
endurance exhibited in his former explor3-
tons he might have reach ID his utmost hope
that of raising the Tag of his country over
the pole" he had spent more than seven
years In The frozen regions of the north; the
proposed colonists will have no such length
OF trial. They are however, to watch for tue
recurrence OF favorable season which the
British expedition did rot wait TO find. but
which some OF the ablest physicists and geo.
graphers, such as Matte Brun, consider a
great probability.
The experience of the Tegethof was not
favorable to the safety of Arctic ve.s sells; but
the escape OF the party and The exceedingly
small loss of life IN all these expeditions
and in the case of The whaling fleets also-is
very marked. The death rate in the British
and American Arctic ships has been far less
than in those employs in any other branch
of the service, from the times of Parry, 1919,
who took home every man safe except one,
10 Hall, who alone of tbirty-three persons
including a babe, was harmed. Sir John
Franklin, long after his perilous land expe-
dftions to the mouths of the Mackenzie and
Ibe Coppermlne, in his Goth year headed his
last expedition in full vigor; and Sir George
Back his friend and companion, was a hale
Engllshman at The age of 50, in 1875, aad
probably SO remains.
IL is no pleasure to state what is confessed
In England as true, that their recent expe-
dition, so iavishly equipped, failed through
want OF proper care of their crews and sledg-
ing parties against scurvy. The official Par
liamentary report of the board of inquiry
before me, gives the Judgment of such Arctic
explorers and officers as Admirals Collinson
1nglefeld and others, which virtually CON
dennis the expedition on this score. Toe
ships crews had been scantlly supplied with
fresh meat, and the sledge- parties after this
privation, Were wholly unprovided with the
well-known anti-scOrbut Cline Juice. For
this last fault the lame apology was offered
that the men had already had enough OF IT,
and that the sledge loads wonld be burdenei
On the other hand, il is still more unhappy
TO md In the voluminOus testimony before
the board that the British surgeons faithfully
condemned the tncTedsed allowance of rum
as promOtive of the disease which turned
back each sledge- party. is failure from
such causes a sound argument against a sci
entific expedition? Halls party left no such
record, for his log shows no increase or al
lowance OF rum, and his surplus stores of
lime juice, found by the British expedition,
was OF ACKNOWLEDGED service to them L, is
Indeed very pleasant to read i'm Capt Mares
own report that "a tablet previously pre-
pared in England was affixed 10 poor Halls
grave, with an inscription that our British
trier dis had followed in his track and .sprof-
tied by his work"
The reference TO Capt. Mares expedition. in
which he admits that he departed from the
Admiralty instructions, would not have been
made above, except that a candid consider
alton of admitted facts, always due, is espe-
ally deserved by the promoters of arduous
enterprises. i will only add that SO good
authority as the late Prof Bachs NAV be
quoted as Affirming that no Arctic expedition
lad gone forth up TO his day, which had not
returned It's full value IN the world.