The San Francisco call., 1896-02-14
fore mankind as the source of the informa-

fore mankind as the source of the informa-
ton.
Regarding the truth of the report, -
continued the venerable savant, 81 prefer
to suspend my judgment for the present.
If the story is true we will have evidence
of it before long, and then we can afford
to believe it. There is no hurry. AS to
the fact itself 1 am far from believing it
beyond the range of possibility. Nansen' S
plan was ingenious, to say the least. He
relied upon the current supposed to de-
scend through Baffins Straits. 1t was,
believe, his original intention to pass
through Bering Straits to the northward,
allow his vessel to become embedded in
an icetioe, and drift with the current across
the pole in case there should be no land
there, emerging from the Polar Sea by way
of Baffins Straits.
However, according to this report
Nansen has taken widely variant course.
Sailing easterly along the northern coasts
of Siberia be would strike the northbound
current from Bering Straits and, accord
ing to his hypothesis, pass over the pole
and leave the Arctic Ocean through Baf-
fins Straits, as I said before He would
not, in fact, could not navigate, strictly
speaking, seeing that his vessel, imbedded
In perhaps thousands of tons CT ice, would
be able to drift only. How, then, can we
believe that he could, after making his
discovery, return to the Siberian coast and
acquaint his agent with the facts, retiring
immediately into the mysterious back
ground and allowing the agent to publish
the discovery to the world? There is a
hole III the saucepan somewhere.
"The route through Bering and Baffins
Straits was the one which the ill-fated
Jeannette would have followed. The fact
of the currents existence seems irrefuta-
bic in view of the relics of the Jeanette
which found their way to the coast of
Greenland. Among these relics, by the
way, were some which would have been of
great interest to us. Some articles of
clothing made in San Francisco and g.
handbook issued by one of the San Fran
cisco banking-houses were a part of the
important find.
All the relics washed ashore in Green.
land, so far as known, were sent to Chris
tianla, where they formed part of geo.
graphical society's collection.
The Geographical Society of the Pacific
naturally desired to gain possession OF
those relics having a special interest for
Californians. Considerable correspondence
between the two societies took place with
out any satisfactory answer. At length,
about eighteen months ago, Mr.. Lund, the
Swedish and Norwegian Consul, paid a
visit to his home and while there made
inquiries as to the Jeanette relics. The
result of his inquiries was enough to dis
gust any man living. The Christiania So
ciety, it appeared, had boxed the relics in
three chests, which were placed in the
charge of one of the organizations men,
bers. This man, who was bachelor with
no immediate relatives, died shortly after
ward, and his heirs took charge of his
effects.
''The relics being considered as merely
lot of rubbish and old clothes were carted
off with the household debris and lost to
the scientific world forever.
81 have only this to say about these
north pole expeditions" said the pro-
fessor in conclusion. at seems as though
explorers would do better to give up look
ing for the astronomic pole beyond the
polar ocean and try to find the magnetic
pole to the northwest of Hudson Bay.
That would be discovery OF incalculable
Importance, and there is at least some
chance of its realization