Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1899-07-28
ARCTIC AND OTHER EXPLORATIONS.

ARCTIC AND OTHER EXPLORATIONS.
The return of DR.. Cook from the Ant
arctic regions has again started the
question in some quarters as to what Is
gained by these explorations. The great
mass of mankind sees the labor and
cost and the expenditure of human suf-
fering and life attending them, and may
be forgiven for asking, What good is it
all? But the man of science plods on.
If he answers at all, it is simply "Wait
and see."
The fact is that few great and brill
liant discoveries are made in the lump.
They usually grow as big trees grow,
from very small seeds. Columbus would
probably have never discovered Amer
lea but for the seeds and wood brought
to Spanish shores by the Gulf Stream.
These were of species unknown to bot
anists of the day, and 1T was natural
Inference that there must be undiscov-
cred land on which these remnants
grew. It is to the collection of these
seeds of thought and new born facts
that the explorer devotes himself, and
when asked for results is justified in
replying, await and see."
A paper in a recent issue of the
''Proceedings of the Academy of Nat
ural Sciences of Philadelphia" by j.
Percy Moore, well illustrates this point.
1t simply descants on snow worm col
lected by MIR. Henry G. Bryant on the
Malaspin glacier in Alaska, and the
work of the scientist ends in describing
a little worm, never more than an inch
long, that is found in immense num-
bers in the Arctic SHOWS. This the
scientist tells US is necessary in order
that future explorers may identify the
creature he describes. When we come to
its habits, the general reader becomes
more interested. Numbers were found
in the snow covering of the glacier, at
times looking like patches of dust on
the surface. Like our ordinary earth
worm, they come to the surface at
night, retreatng beneath the snow
when the sun rises. The glacier on
which these were found is about seven
ty miles long by thirty wide. Animal
life on it was rare. OF birds only few
gulls, a few species of moth, and few
spiders and flies were about all. a
small fealike insect was in the melted
water and in the dry snow with the
worms. and the temperature in which
they existed must be regularly about 30
degrees.
Still the great public inquiries, What
of all this: Simply that it furnishes the
key to a great Arctic mystery, namely,
L., t. 81 nf NH al
life sustained;
As in our communities 1t Is said that
the farmer feedeth all. so all animal life
must primarily depend on vegetation.
Big fish may eat the little fish, and the
little ones the smaller, but down at the
base must be creatures that depend
wholly on vegetable life. We may now
see from Bryant's observations why
fish abound, through the immense
amount of food in the shape of snow
worms. borne down by the summers
melting SHOWS. On these fish the larger
creatures feed. But what sustains the
snow worm and the snow beetle: Here
again scientific distractions help US.
Those leathery looking plants known
as lichens grow in profusion over Arc
tic rocks, and minute species of fungi
have home in the snow as in the case
of the worms themselves. The repro
ductive spores of these vegetable or
ganisms are so fine that they are borne
by the winds over the snow fields in
every direction, while, doubtless, pol
len from far distant shores, to say
nothing of the pollen from the Arctics
own beautiful summer flowers, must be
sifted from the winds as they pass over
the snow capped mountains, furnishing
storehouses of food during the long
winters for any minute creatures that
may make snow drift favored home.
Do explorations pay: Well may those
who expose themselves to perils and
hardships for the sake of science reply,
"Wait and see.''
In the present instance we are
brought face TO face with the astound-
ing fact that to minute vegetable Or
ganisms, that only a powerful micro
scope can reveal TO us, the strange pro-
fusion of animal life in the Arctcs de-
pends.
Any new fact, however trifling 1t APP
pears, may have a powerful influence
on broadening useful knowledge. Phil
adelphia Public Ledger.
In summer.
People keep right or eating and drink
ing in summer time. They wear clothes
NOT many pprbans hut mora