The new Northwest. [volume] (Portland, Or.) 1871-1887, 1877-01-19
The Sea Around the Pole.

Additional details from the returned
/ British Arctic expedition show yet more
clearly the difficulties encountered. A
new name is proposed for the ocean that
! is supposed to surround the pole-the
"Pai@Ocrystic Sea"-i. e., the sea of an
cient ice. The belief of the explorers is
| that the ice there has been accumulat-
! ing for years, if not for centuries, and
! that the sea is never free from it. The
description given of this ice shows that
it is quite different from that which is
/ found forming each winter in high lati-
! tude and breaking up and floating SOUTH
ward with every open summer. At its
! lowest point the ice of that northern
most sea fOated fifteen feet above water
level; it resembled low icebergs; in
| places its thickness was from $50 to 200
| feet. The accounts indicate, though
they do not distinctly state, that this ice
is in motion, and map in Nature gives
! the direction of the drift as to the east
ward. That the ice is in separate masses
/ is further presumable, from the fact that
soundings were obtained at the highest
latitude reached by the sledges, proving
| that the depth of the sea at that point
was only seventy fathoms. 1t is possi-
| BILE, however, that the soundings were
obtained through hole in the ice made
by blasting.
The obstacles which, this ice presented
| to sledge travel can now be better un-
derstoOd. Its masses had been jammed
| together so as to create an utterly irreg-
ular surface, which could only be re-
duced so that sledges were drawn over it
/ by making a road with a pick-aXe. The
actual advance made to the northward,
with the greatest labor, was only seven
ty-three miles from the place where the
"Alert" was harbOred, but nearly four
times that distance was passed over by
the sledge party in dragging their loads
by iustallments, and seventy-twO days
were consumed in the effort. 1t is evil
dent that the task of sledging along the
shore was much less arduOus than that
of advancing nOrthward over the frozen
sea. The party that went to the west
ward made three or four times as much
progress, and the party to the eastward
more than twice as much, as that which
went nOrthward The route of the
western coast party after rounding Cape
Joseph Henry was nearly due west fol
! the latter half, ending in latitude SO TO-
and longitude $50 30/. That route has
been spoken of in kilograms as along the
north coast of the continent, particu'
larly in specifying the position of Cape
Columbia, latitude $50 Z longitude 20
3OI, the highest land discovered; but Mr.
Richard A. Proctor, commenting upoT
the news, says that this land on the
western side of Smiths Sound is a range
of islands. The eastern coast party
traced the western shore of Greenlanr
in a north-easterly direction up to lati
tude so so and longitude 4S0 30/. Tht
highest point reached by the expedition
is now exactly specified as $50 20 26/.
Before a determinate opinion can bt
formed as to whether these results pre-
clude further attempts by the Smith
Sound route, it will have TO be showI
whether the thick-ribbed ice of th
"Pal9ocrystic Sea" is permanent o
changing iu its position at the head 0
Smiths Sound. If it drifts at all, ther
; is a possibility that in some years j
may move southwark. English writers
) since the return of the expedition, seen
, to regard the gate by Smiths SOun a
! ! hopelessly closed. They generally speal
of the Spitzbergen route as the only al
: tentative. Mr.. Proctor makes the resul
an occasion for expressing the hope tina
Antarctic rather than Arctic research
e will next be attempted. Certainly tn
l results of the British expedition cannO
{ be called encouraging to polar eXplol
D ers, though it has furnished geOgrapher
with nearly six hundred miles of tn
: southern boundary of hitherto III
. known sea.-N. Y. Tribune.