News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1882-07-20
AN ARCTIC HERO.
The Last Days of De Long and his
Heroic Little Party.
TFrom the New York Times.1

Heroic Little Party.
EFrom the New York Times.l
The diary of Lieut.. De Long extends
from Oct. l to Oct. 80. 1t is the record
of terrible suffering borne with indom-
liable heroism and ending in death.
There is not in literature a nobler or
more pathetic story.
De Long and his men died of cold and
hunger. They supported life during
thirty days by the adoption of every
means known to shipwrecked men ex-
cept c~annibalism. No one seems to
have thought of that horrible expedient.
At first they had a little dog meat, and
they managed to shoot two or three
ptarmigans; then they we're reduced to
tea made of willow twigs and to alco-
hol. At last they gnawed the leather of
their boots and bits of deer-skin, and
then, too weak to continue their march,
lay down to die. They were slowly
dying of starvation for three weeks, and
in this condition had to resist as best
they could the terrible cold. Through
it all they never lost their courage.
"All hands weak and feeble, but cheer
full, 3" wrote De Long, when it must
have been perfectly clear that nothing
but a miracle could save the party from
death. There is not a line in the whole
diary of complaint or murmuring against
God or man.
1t too often happens that discipline
vanishes among shipwreoked men, and
that the selfish desire of life leads to
inhumanity, if not to actual crime.
There is nc such stain in the story of
the Jeanette. Lieut.. De Long seems
to have maintained his authority IN
questioned to the last, and his men evi-
IDENTIFY shared his generous spirit. For
days they dragged a sick companion
with them dashed to a sled, and never
seemed to have thought of abandoning
him In order to increase their own
chances of reaching a settlement. The
officers and men never manifested the
slightest hesitation between duty and
selfishness. They chung together and
helped II another Loyalty while living,
and SO long IS the survivors had
strength their dead comrades we're given
Christian burial. There was apparently
no difference in the bearing and devo-
ton of De Long the American, Erick-
son the Dane, or All Sam the China
man Every man of the little band was
a hero, knowing how to do his duty
and doing it with unfiinchlng faithful
ness.
In their distress the shipwrecked men
turned for help to God. In De Longs
diary there is constant mention of re-
igious services. When the faithful
Alexy was dying the surgeon baptized
him, and when all hope had gone we
are told that call united in saying the
Lords Prayer and Greed" The hum
BILE, cheerful trust in God and submis-
sion to His will, of which De Longs
diary gives constant evidence, shows US
that it was a band of Christian heroes
that persisted in the Siberian snow.
Bitterly as We may at first sight re-
greet that so many noble lives have been
lost, the men of the Jeannette's crew
did not die in vain. Their fate suggests
that beautiful passage in the Prayer
book where we thank God for those
who have departed this life in His fear.
De Long and his men have made us
prouder of our own humanity. They
have shown us to what sublime heights
heroism educated officers and igno-
rant seamen can attain alike.
They have given an example of calm
and cheerful performance of duty which
is without price. They have shown us
more that faith in God can sur
vive all suffering. Let us thank God
for the life and death of these heroic |
men.
It is impossible that their heroism can
fail to bear its priceless and perennial
But let us have no more costly
sacrifices of lives in the vain search for
the pole. 1t is idle as well as ungener-
GUS to blame the projectors of the jean
nette expedition for its disasterous fail
iAO NCS5ci WAS W lOlAON d IOuJS
untried, and there was ample
Justification for testing the question
whether the pole could be reached by
THAT route. Exploration becomes I'M
iustifable only when it is demonstrated
that the end sought cannot be attained
in spite of every effort and sacrifice.
When the Jeanette sailed it had not
been demonstrated that the pole could
not be reached by steering ~northward
Wrangell Land. Her experience
has now proved that the ice barrier is
rs impenetrable in hat direction as it is
wherever else it has been attacked. The
that the pole can ever be
are now so infinitesimally small
that we are not justified in wasting any
more lives In polar expeditions. To
send out another expedition would show
a reckless indifference to human life of
which any nation ought to be ashamed
Let us close the record OF hopeless
heroism and useless sufferings In the
sea with the story of the nobIest
of all the Arctic heroes, George W. De
7 ,Opn