The St. Johns herald., 1891-08-06
ARCTIC EXPLORATIONS.
The Latest Schemes for Reaching
 the North Pole.
Ships, Balloons and Dog-Sleds to Be Em- ployed in the Efforts to Solve That Profoundest of
 Mysteries.

Mysteries.
 Find something so difficult of accom- pEshment as to be deemed impossible, and immediately you discover that there are plenty of daring spirits ready to risk life and limb in an attempt to prove that it is not impossible. For more than two hundred years, says the Boston Transcript, the north pole has been the Mecca of forlorn-hope ven- lures. Disasters upon disasters have not dismayed the scientific enthusiasts; and June next Dr. Frithy, of Nansen, an intrepid Norwegian explorer, who has already won his spurs in this field by his daring journey across Greenland, will start from Europe in small vessel built expressly for the purpose and so constructed as to be able to withstand the nippings of the ice foes which sent the Jeannettc to the bottom. The yes sel will be provisioned for five years and will carry strong small boats, sleds, dogs, etc., for use in case of accident to the ship. Nanscn believes that currents exist in that region that have an easterly tendency as far as the longitude of the Siberian rivers, where he expects to find a northerly current which will bear him north to within the vicinity of the pole. He bases his opinion of an east erly current or currents on the fact that certain articles left on the wreck of the Jeannette in the opposite part of the polar sea drifted in three years to the coast of Greenland. So he will take his ship to the place where the Jeannette went down, and allow it to drift with the ice foes until the northern currents are reached. In this way he will not have to stem currents or resist ice foes, but will allow them to carry him to his destination. Northern currents, he thinks, must be formed by the empty ing of the Siberian rivers into the Polar sea.
 Another scheme to reach the north pole is that of two enthusiastic young Frenchmen, who propose to drift over the pole in a specially constructed balloon. This air ship will be strongly constructed of two thicknesses of China silk, and will have small interior balloon, the object of which is to pro- vide that tse larger envelop shall al- ways be inflated. Four subsidiary balloons and slxTeen very sITan p5rt- looms will be attached to the larger one, both to afford auxiliary gas and for scientific use in determining the direc- tion of air currents at the pole. The big balloon will have capacity of forty-five thousand cubic feet of hydro gen gas and is estimated to have carrying capacity of more than eight thousand pounds. The car is of novel construction and looks like a small house. 1t is to be made of wicker coat ed with thin plates of steel and will be water-tight. The equipment will be, besides the five men and number of dogs, provisions for eighty days, a sleigh, an unsuitable canoe, scientific instruments, etc. According to pro gramme they will leave Spitzenbergen in the summer of 1892, sometime when a wind is found blowing directly over the pole. They expect to be in the air ten days and to land in Alaska or west ern Asia. The scheme is not indorsed by the French aronautical societies. A plan of polar research that is likely to be of more practical value than either of the aforementioned expeditions, which are only to satisfy scientific curiosity,is the scheme developed in Aus tralia for the exploration of the Ant arctic region. Since the celebrated ex- petition of Sir James Ross in 1S39-43 in the Erebus and Terror, no attempt has ! been made to investigate this region. However, in the fall of the present year an expedition will set out under the command of Baron Nordenskjold, one of the most experienced polar travel CTS living, to explore the Antarctic dis trict, and hopes are entertained in Aus tralia that new fisheries for whales, seals, cod, etc, will be found, that will ! prove of intrinsic value to the colony. Incidentally Baron Nordenskjold may determine whether the Antarctic conti- nent is really Q continent or an archi- pelago; ascertain the nature of the fossil plants, animals, etc. It would seem that this Antarctic region offered a much broader and better field for ex- ploration than the Arctic. Ross pen etrated to close on to eighty degrees South.
 Natural Gas in England.
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