The courier. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1894-1903, 1897-12-18

SOnal endurance i'm all that voyage. he
mentioned: but he described the kill
ing Of his two faithful dogs as the
most trying ordeal he had to face in
those three years. Il could not vera
well kill my own dog. ! Kill Yohan-
sens an Yohansen he kill mine"
Can't you just hear Eric Erickson
say il?
Months Of marching over ice hum
mOcks in frozen clothing. dragging
heavy sledges. he described as "verra
hard work" / don't believe the man
has superlative adjective in his vo-
cabulary. He seems better acquainted
with big deeds than big words. \
hero is a fine thing. but modest hero
is almost too good To he true.
The story of his lecture is too well
known to need repetition. Here.
however, is "A bit of the descriptive
part Of his talk, taken down in short
hand and done into rather more con-
ventional English than he used. His
lecture throughout was illustrated by
stereOpticOn pictures which were 50
beautiful that they quite Overcame
ones prejudice against that sort Of
thing.
Sometimes we had a smoking con-
cert. Some Of the men sang. or played
the accordion or some other musical
instrument on board. We had an excel
lent library. We had plenty OF time to
read, and 1 believe that many Of the
men on board have no reason to regret
they spent those days in reading. as they
learned more during those three years
than during the whole OF the rest OF
their lives. We had plenty Of games on
board-cbess and dOminoes and cards
OF course, three years spent in such
surroundil gs. becomes little monoto-
nous. But these places in the north
have their attractions. There was one
long polar night that lasted for months.
and many of the men would get tired Of
the perpetual darkness and would long
for the daylight again, and spring came
like fairy tale laid in frost and snow.
The ship was covered from the the top
to the deck with snow and ever, thing
was pure and clean. and then the Gun
arose from the horizan and would circle
around the SKY day and night for five
months, perh:ps without break. The
SNOW would NIT Away to some extent,
and the chip would be surrounded with
ice, and the ice was so white, and the
sun rises higher and higher in the SKY,
and the eky loses its cOlor-only Da'e
blue sky-and you long for some cOlors.
There is nothing to rest your eye upon.
and you have to prote ct your ey es against
the dazz ing light by help Of snow glasses
in order to avoid snow binding.
You get tired Of the long polar days.
and then perhaps you begin t. long for
the polar night with the stars again.
But the fall comes. the sun sinks to the
horizon again, and then at midnight you
have a most wonderful sky. The sun
sinks de eper..and the evening sky gets
clearer and the ice world is dreaming in
the light of the northern stiffness. At
last the sun disappears under the hori-
ION, and then the dawn in the south
grows fainter and fainter every day.
But it was wonderfully beautiful. this
twilight of the dying. disappearing polar
day. 1t is like dreamland. painted In
the imagination's most delicate tins.
1t is q far awav. faint clear music. a dis
tant. subdued melody. 1t is a cad
scene OF the dying day"
DIR. NanSen said, in a conversation
at the hotel before the lecture. that
he had read great deal of Browning
during that voyage. suppose it was
in the desperation Of Polar night
that he read Prince HOhenstiel-
Schwangua. Heaven knows it wonld
take nothing less to take post OF us
through the Prince.