Omaha daily bee., 1884-08-13
POLAR LIFE.
Two Trips to Cape b cchy-A Big
Wolf KiIlod-BeautifUl Arctic
Phenomena-The Suns
Farewell,

Farewell,
New York Herald.
While the first exploring party sent out
by Lieut.. Greedy was on the way to Lin
coin bay, he was encouraged by the open
water in Halls basin, to send a boat par.
ty, under Sergeant Brainard to Cape
Beechy. The story that follows of their
trip, and of camp life In the polar regions,
is taken from Sergeant Rice's diary:
This expedition to Cape Beechy en-.
countered the greatest difficulties and ex.
perienced remarkable escapes from being
crushed between the ever moving and
changing ice-loes that threatened to close
in on the party. When Mount Beaufort,
a few miles short Of our destination. was
reached, 1t was found impossible to return
by water because of the crowding Ice.
C~onseqently the boat in which the party
had come was hauled upon the i%ce-fort,
where it remained until August of next
year, and 30 the return to the sta.
ton was made by land. The time In
which the round trip was made was from
August 81 to September 3, inclusive. On
September 10 a party met a pack OF nine
teen wolves, but the animals, although
apparently hungry, would not come
within rifle shot. By September
20, it was concluded that, ra
the temperature was but 10 degrees be-
low zero, the party was in the midst of an
Indian summer. The increasing cold,
however, soon drove the members of the
party indoors, although the outdoor
work was still prosecuted vigorously. The
working party were banking the house
and piling and covering up the provisions
and commissary stores. The scientific
corps were hourly observing barometers,
thermometers, and tide guage, watching
the vagaries of the magnet, and making
photographs. By September 23d, wolves
had located themselves near the station,
their prey being musk-oxen. A wolf
weighing eighty-one pounds, and having
''long white fur, sparsely in~termingled
on the back with black hair" was shot
almost from the door of tho station,
| where 1t had doubtless been attracted
by the pangs of hunger. The animal
measured five feet!nine inches from nose
to tip of tall, and stood thirty.three inches
high. "We were," writes Sergt. Rice,
''struck with the great resemblance to
our dogs, and could readily accept the
theory that the esqqimoux dog Is only a
domesticated wolf. The tracks of both
are similar, and the only difference that
we could detect was In size."
On Sept. "a, Lieut.. Lockwood, with
four men, went with provisions to de-
partment 3d." near Cape Beechy, and
threee days latter returned with q sect
lon of a large snd well-preserved piece of
driftwood, thirty feet long and ten inch.
es In diameter, that had been fonnd in
st. Patrick's bay. The Fahrenheit scale
showed the following thermometrlc scale
for September: Mean temperature,
1919; maximum 80; and minimum 1914.
October opened with cloudy, dreary
weather, and on the second day of the
month the thermometer of 20 degrees,
from 9 degrees above to 1873 below.
On October 4 "a beautiful halo accomp-
anied the sun all day, and in the evening
mock moons were observed. These
Arctic phenomena were of frequent &C.
currence during the autumn" During
this time the temperature outside was "a
and % degrees, and during October con-
siderable snow fell, though this did not
prevent small partiS5 from being on the
hunt almost all the tine to Cape Bair6
and the Bellows for musk-ox meat.
Mount Ovitus was also assembled though
this was attended with much difficulty,
as 1t rises above the nov
valleys and cliffs 1900 feet.
"There was p writes Sergeant Rice,
something awful in the impressive
scene of %desolation spread around. No
sign of animal or vegetable life-bare,
desolste and chaotic:- "a world unfinished
by the hand of its CREATOR and such 81
fence! | am sure that ordinary quiet
would have been an uproar compared to
that which surrounded us. Eugene
Aram should have been transported by
the poet to such a place to give full play
to his study of a guilty conscience" All
this while the sun had been gradually
curtailing Its light, and on October Ia it
disappeared for 1876 days, and in de-
scribing this change the diary reads:
"We all rushed out at noon, and, sure
enough, 'Old Sol only showed part of his
disk for q few moments, sprinkling the
Ice and snow with silver and crystals,
and then sank lazily back In a beautiful
glow of warm, rosy colors. 1t was one
of the few glorious pictures youohsafed
the Arctic sojouIner, but one which car
ried with 1t too many shadows, as we
thought of the night of months when
even the recreant sun leaves and Is
away with our absent friends at
home. Then succeeded a soft, misty,
pearly twilight, merging a few hours later
into darknnss, and each day the twilight
decreased until, a week later, Jupiter,
Arcturus, Capella, and Alpha Gemino-
run twinkled dimly at midday. In a
few days they were joined by Mars, Po-
laris, Vega, Castor aud Pollux, and the
Cygni." The light was still sufficient to
enable a short trip to be made. Our
party had gone to Beechy and built a
commodlus snow house for the accommo-
dation of prospective sledge parties.
Others had mined Goals and taken them
to Cape Murchison. Fourteen daya after
the sun had disappeared Sergt. Rice tes-
ted the active power Of the solar light by
exposing a sensitive Photographic plate
one of Carbutt's dry plates-for an hour
at noon, and got a very distinct impress
sion of a landscape. The same expert
ment was repeated with aim )st as good a
result the next spring, seventeen days
before the temperance of the sun. The
minimum temperature for October was
|-3l.l, with a mean range of -9.2.
These figures were noted from hourly OBJ
servations, and were duly corrected as to
show accuracy.
ORIGIN OF AMMONIA.
Ammonia is obtained in large quantities by
Al --. II. n