Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1897-11-25

sen is tall, athletic and supple. His
pleasing. AS he smiles he might be
taken Ter an OVergroWn boy. A nearer
insp Gtion of him, however, shows
besides his marvellous physique a cold
ness at times that bespeaks great
strength, an indomitable will and
desperate recklessness, qualities that
made possible the success of his great
undertaking. His voice is pleasing
aud of good range. He speaks with
foreign accent which is noticeable
at first but which is entirely lost sight
of when he has entered upon his thrill
ling narration. The wierd beauties
of the frost world alternated in inter
est with the most hair-raising ad-
ventures. For nearly half an hour he
expended the fertility of his resource
full powers Of description in attempt
ing to do justice to the glory of the
aurora and the polar night. He is the
poet of the silent boreal world as well
as the scientific explorer. He led his
hearers over dream bridges of light
vague as a foreboding" from one
! phenomenon of color etherealize6
to another and it seemed to conc
truly from his heart when he said h
sometimes longed for their beauties
again.
Dr. Nansen entered from the rear
stairway accompanied by President
Adams. A wave of applause went up
as he appeared and his wild, rowing
eye frightened as the university yell
was given twice His appearance in
evening dress contrasted strongly
with the stereopticon pictures of his
Arctic suit and he seemed the less en-
barrassed in the latter. President
Adams in Introducing him said: THE
great hour has arrived. The viking
is here. Norway welcomed home her
son for what he achieved. The state
! of Wisconsin welcomes him with more
| than usual enthusiasm because it has
within it's borders a larger body of his
his countrymen than any other state
! in the union. Many of us have fol-
lowed his story from the moment
when tiny hand at the window
babe him a pathetic goodby until
three years later he came back to the
arms of Norway and the whole civil
! lied world"
He praised him for his scientific re-
suits and his remarkable care and
foresight in bringing back all his
heroes as we'll as they started out.
DR.. Nansen in opening thanked the
audience for coming to hear talk or
snow and ice and plunged at once
into his lecture. He told briefly OF
/ how he arrived at his theory of {
polar drift and how the expedition
Jared until the ship Fran was frozer
into Siberian waters. He continued
in part:
YES three years we were to pas.
in this icy, unknown north. Yet it..
a rather jolly region. There's any
amount of pleasure to be had III
there. For we never got sick. Sick
ness is mostly germs, you know, AM
Their aren't any germs up there. No
one man ever had a cold during tn
whole three years. The first thin,
we all did on coming back to Europ
was to go out and catch a cold. w
had a doctor along, of course. Blu
he had nothing to do except to writ
prescriptions for the dogs. We al
ways enjoyed our three meals a day
And after supper we'd sit about tn
cabin, play violins, concertina
or sing or hold a smoker or pla,
cards or read We had a marvelou
amount of fun playing cards, as yo
can see by our pictures. Yet we wer
busy more or less with our daily oh
servations, meteorological and astro
nomical. When it was 40 to so beloy
zero we'd often freeze a finger i