Nansen had forgotten that his face and hair were still begrimed with the dirt and grease of months of travel, and that his own family might have been forgiven for not recognising in the unkempt, travel-stained, long-haired man, the smart, well-set-up Norwegian doctor. Now, however, that he was known, he listened with great interest to the information that his companion, Mr. F. G. Jackson, leader of the Jackson-Harmsworth expedition, was able to give him. When they reached the encampment of the party on Cape Flora, every one turned out in answer to the leader's call and gave the intrepid explorer a characteristic British greeting. Then they photographed him, as he stood, before they took him into the house and supplied him with the luxury he had not known for more than a year—of a cake of soap and a change of clothes.

While he was enjoying his bath, his hosts exchanged opinions. The fact that he had arrived on foot and alone suggested to them the idea that he was the only survivor of the thirteen who had set out in the Fram, and they decided to make no reference to what might be a very unhappy memory. Consequently, when Nansen reappeared, clean and comfortably clad, they had a meal ready for him, and urged him to set to at once. He looked at them and asked where his comrade Johansen was. Had they not brought him in? Of course they knew nothing about Johansen; they believed Nansen was the only survivor, and he had been so long out of the world that it had never occurred to him it was necessary to tell them Johansen was waiting for him to return to breakfast. When two men see no one else but themselves for more than a year, it is not to be wondered at that they forget the rest of the world is not in touch with them.

As soon as he mentioned the fact that Johansen was in the neighbourhood, a party at once started off to fetch him, and the worthy lieutenant was as much surprised as they had been when they came upon him. They at once took charge of him and his belongings, and a few hours later he and Nansen, well washed, well clad, and well fed, were smoking cigars in comfortable chairs in the dining-room of the hospitable Jackson's quarters, the heroes of the occasion.

Three weeks later they were sailing south to Norway in the Windward, and arrived at Vardo on August 13, 1896. A week later the Fram entered the same port, with all her crew in good health, and with nearly three years' supplies still on board.

The record of her voyage, after the departure of Nansen and Johansen on March 14, 1895, was very satisfactory. She drifted steadily in the ice towards the north-west until she touched as high as 85° 57' N. At the end of February 1896 she became stationary, and remained so until the middle of July, when the crew forced a passage through the ice into open water, and from thence the Fram sailed to Norway. The first news the crew received on arrival at Vardo was that Nansen and Johansen had reached there just a week before. They had had some misgivings as to the safety of their two adventurous comrades, and the news of their return cleared away the only sign of uneasiness from the otherwise happy minds of the men who formed one of the most successful expeditions that has ever set out in search of the North Pole.

CHAPTER IX FRANZ JOSEF LAND AND SPITZBERGEN

The Jackson-Harmsworth Expedition—Object of the Expedition—An Interesting Experiment—The Franz Josef Land Question settled—A Group of Islands, not a Continent—Conway at Spitzbergen—Ancient History—Bygone Splendours—Scenery in the Making—The Romance of Andrée—Another Riddle.

The interest and admiration aroused by the brilliant achievements of the Nansen expedition eclipsed in the public mind, for the time being, the work of other and contemporary expeditions, the members of which, nevertheless, were doing admirable service to the cause of science in and about the Arctic Circle. Prominent among these may be mentioned the Jackson-Harmsworth expedition to Franz Josef Land (whose presence there was of such signal service to Nansen and Johansen when, as is related in the preceding chapter, they emerged from their historic dash for the Pole), the Conway exploration of Spitzbergen, and the aeronautical attempt to reach the Pole made by Herr Andrée.

The Jackson-Harmsworth expedition left London on July 11, 1894, in the steam yacht Windward, Captain Browne, for Franz Josef Land, and comprised the leader, Mr. Frederick G. Jackson; Lieutenant Armitage, R.N.R., astronomer; Dr. Kottlitz, medical officer; Mr. W. S. Bruce, zoologist; and Messrs. Wilton and Heywood. A complete outfit, with stores and provisions for three years was taken. It is an interesting fact that this undertaking was the first instance of an individual London newspaper proprietor displaying the generous enterprise which owners of great American journals had already shown. Lord Northcliffe (then Mr. Alfred Harmsworth) contributed to the expedition the most necessary factor for a prolonged stay in the Arctic regions, the sinews of war.

On arrival at Franz Josef Land, a site for the camp was selected near Cape Flora, and the camp, to which the name Elmwood was given, was laid out. It consisted of a Russian log-house and several canvas houses, as the first intention was to lodge the members in the canvas structures. But very little experience showed that canvas was not the most comfortable material for residential purposes in Arctic regions, so the whole party moved into the log-house, using the canvas structures for warehousing stores. Here they lived during the three years that the expedition was away, and so well off were they that during the whole period not one member had a day's illness. As the leader said on his return to England in 1897, "a jollier, healthier, and busier little community never existed." They were always busy, and every moment of the day was occupied. Even in the dark winter period they found constant employment for their hands and minds.

In the high latitude where they were the sun set for the last time about the middle of October, and was not again visible until the latter end of February. From the day the sun went below the horizon until the middle of November there was about a couple of hours faint twilight at "noon," but, after that, midday and midnight were not to be distinguished by any change in the light of the sky. It was always dark.

During this period, when the members were in winter quarters, they kept very regular hours. At 8.30 A.M. they had breakfast, and when the meal was over each one took up some part of the household duties—washing the dishes, making the beds, sweeping the rooms, feeding the dogs, and such like. Unless the weather was very stormy, a couple of hours was spent in exercise over the snow on ski, or if the weather was too inclement to allow them to go far away, they spent the two hours in exercising round the house. At 2 P.M. they gathered again round the dining-table and partook of tea, bread and butter, and cheese, spending the afternoon in making tents and harness for the sledge dogs, or anything else that was wanted. At 7.30 P.M. they had dinner, passing the remainder of the evening in reading, smoking, games, &c., until 11.30 P.M., when they retired to their bunks.

Of food they always had plenty, living very largely on the game killed. During the last winter they were at Elmwood a chief article of diet was an Arctic bird, the loon. Great numbers of these visited the islands in the mild seasons, and in the autumn before the expedition returned 1400 were shot and frozen for winter food. As the loons only arrive during the mild season and disappear as soon as winter sets in, Mr. Jackson, in the last autumn he was at Elmwood, caught a number both of loons and kittiwakes, and having attached a copper label to each, with the letter J. engraved upon it, liberated the lot. By this means it is hoped to learn where the birds go to in the winter, for should any bird bearing a copper label be shot in Scotland, Norway, or elsewhere, it will show where their refuge is situated.

The primary object of the expedition was to make a complete exploration of Franz Josef Land, which was formerly considered to be merely the southern extremity of a vast tract of land, possibly a second Greenland, and extending up towards the Pole. The result of the three years' work was to effectually disprove this opinion by showing that in place of a continent there was only a group of small scattered islands. Various voyagers had returned from time to time and reported observations of land in the locality, with high mountain ranges. Gillies Land, Petermann Land, and King Oscar Land all had existence on the maps; but the Jackson-Harmsworth party could only find scattered islands where the coast of Franz Josef Land was charted, and hummocks of piled-up ice where mountain ridges had been seen. Of Gillies Land, Petermann Land, and King Oscar Land no trace could be found. When the expedition went on board the Windward to return to England, the vessel steamed north-west for fifty miles without seeing any indication of land, the water being open and with less ice than would have been probable had land been near. And yet they were in the locality where Gillies Land was marked on the chart. A journey was also made to within ten miles of the spot where Eastern Johannessen Land was placed on the chart, but no signs of land were visible, although the weather was clear at the time.

During the three years spent at Elmwood, exploring and surveying journeys were frequent in the mild seasons, and the arduous nature of the work done is well shown in the account of the last two journeys undertaken prior to returning to England. On March 16, 1897, a party consisting of Jackson and Armitage, with sledges, thirteen dogs, a pony, and a canoe, set out from the log-house with the intention of going round the western side of Franz Josef Land in order to define its limits. From the start they had to face stormy weather, while the snow was both deep and soft, and the ice rough and treacherous. After a fortnight's travelling, during which they came upon a hitherto undiscovered headland and fjord, they rounded the north-eastern extremity of the western land. Continuing their journey westward, they had to battle against the severity of the weather, the temperature going as low as 40° below zero, and proving disastrous to the animals. By April 7 nearly all the dogs were dead, and progress was very slow and difficult. Three days later the nature of the ice along the shores compelled them to turn inland, and they had to make the best of their way over glaciated land 1500 feet high. Out to sea there was open water, and as they progressed they found that the water was free from ice right up to the glacier face. Then the pony died, and with only their diminished team of dogs to haul, they were obliged to abandon everything that was not absolutely necessary to maintain them during the remainder of their journey. The weather grew worse and worse, and for days they were surrounded by thick heavy mists, with strong gales and drifting snow. They tried to find a way along the shore, leaving the high glacier summit, but what ice there was on the coast was breaking up so rapidly that they were compelled once more to climb to the high level, abandoning the canoe, as there was no chance of their being able to use it.

While regaining the higher level, they came upon the only bear met with during the whole journey, and they were careful not to allow him to escape, his flesh and fat being welcome additions to their stock of food and fuel. The gales now became more severe, until they found it impossible to travel when one was blowing. Consequently they had to press forward as fast and as far as they could in between the blows, and on one occasion were marching for twenty-four hours at a stretch. The ice was also terribly trying, and so rough was it in places that they frequently had to go three times over the same track before they could find a way over or round some awkward obstacle. At one time they were pushing across the ice of a bay, when they were suddenly stopped by the ice opening on to free water, and, after retracing their steps, they had to climb and haul their stores up the steep sides of the glacier to the summit, forty-five feet above the sea-level.

When they set out, it was arranged that a relief party should meet them at Bell Island the third week in April, but so many delays had been caused that they were not able to reach the rendezvous until a fortnight after the time fixed. The relief party had been waiting for them, considerably anxious at their non-appearance. In the two months they had been travelling, they had had only thirteen and a half fine days.

After returning to Elmwood and resting for ten days, the two again set out to the eastward. They were travelling over the ice, on the second day out, when it gave way under the sledge. They lost all their stores and equipment, and saturated their cartridges. They had at once to turn back, but the ice was growing so thin that they had great difficulty in reaching the shore. For nearly twenty-six hours they had to keep marching before they covered the forty-two miles which lay between the scene of their disaster and Elmwood. This was the last journey undertaken prior to their departure in the Windward for England a month or so later.

The account of the achievements of this expedition would be incomplete were no mention made of two open-water discoveries. One was that of the British Channel, an open-water tract extending from the islands into an open sea, which formed the second discovery, and was named Queen Victoria Sea in honour of the then reigning sovereign. This sea was observed to be free from ice all the time the expedition was on the islands, and the information thus obtained was of considerable service to the Italian explorers who, a few years later, made an ineffectual dash to reach the Pole over the ice-fields.

Further valuable information was obtained by geological observations of the islands. These demonstrated that the islands were an archipelago, formed from the remains of a fairly extensive tableland, the surface of which was composed of basalt so similar in character as to be almost identical with the basalts of the north of Scotland. To the scientific mind this suggests that at one time these far-outlying islands were connected with lands from which they are now separated by enormous stretches of sea, and were subject, in that distant period, to the same volcanic outbursts and covered by the same basaltic flows that resulted. It must have been a period of enormous volcanic activity, for the beds of basalt overlying the fossil-bearing strata averaged six hundred feet in thickness, while evidence of successive flows is found in the existence of sedimentary fossil-bearing rocks sandwiched between layers of basalt.

Raised beaches were frequently noticed. In one case, on a beach fifty feet above the present sea-level, a pine tree, evidently of considerable age and about twenty feet in length, was found where it had obviously been thrown up by the tide in the bygone years when the beach formed the shore of the sea. Under this beach there was a bed of sandstone showing fossils of plant remains, while above it towered basalt cliffs five hundred feet high. Lignite and bituminous shale were met with in the sandstone under the basalt, and, in muddy stretches of country, horns and other remains of reindeer were found, though there are no living representatives of these animals now on the islands. Among the fossils brought away was one of a plant long since extinct in all parts of the world save Japan, where the tree is still a flourishing variety.

While Franz Josef Land was being explored and mapped, a private expedition formed by Sir Martin Conway visited Spitzbergen. It was this island which Sir John Franklin advocated should be the base of operations for an expedition to the Pole. The reason for this opinion was the belief that Spitzbergen was merely the most southerly point of a chain of islands, if not of an island continent, stretching away to the north. A similar idea, held in regard to Franz Josef Land, was dispelled by the Jackson-Harmsworth expedition; the information which was made available on the return of the Conway party also dispelled the Franklin view.

Curiously enough the objective of the expedition is one of the most anciently discovered lands in the Arctic regions, and one that has a history full of incident; yet the interior was unknown to man from the time of its discovery in the sixteenth century to the time when Sir Martin Conway and his companions pushed their way in from the coast. Owing to the tail-end of the Gulf Stream reaching as far as its shores, the seas round Spitzbergen are freer from ice than any other seas in equally high latitudes. Situated in from 80° to 82° N., the group of islands, to which the single name is given, was first discovered by two Dutch navigators, Barendszoon and Heemskirk, who, in the year 1596, were trying to find a way of reaching China through the Arctic Sea. Eleven years later, Hudson sailed among the islands while trying for a northern route to the Indies. Failing in his attempt to get round by the north, he returned to Spitzbergen and saw how the waters were literally teeming with whales, walrus, seals, and other oil-giving animals. A flourishing fishery was started, and for years proved a bone of contention among the various maritime nations. No one country caring to annex the islands, they were practically a no-man's land, where each little colony of fishers were as a law unto themselves, though not necessarily to any one else. Consequently fights were frequent and much ill-will engendered, until the Dutch and the British Governments stepped in and came to a mutual understanding on the matter. About this time the fishery trade was so important that one colony numbered over 20,000 inhabitants during the season; but it was not a settled population, and a few years after the understanding had been arrived at, the colony was deserted owing to the ruthless slaughter of all marine animals having practically exterminated them in the vicinity. From that time the islands have been neglected, save for the occasional visits of a few trappers, until Sir Martin Conway and his companions penetrated to the interior, and came back with so many delightful experiences that an enterprising company was formed to make this snow-laden district a place for summer resort.

From a geological point of view the main island is full of interest, for the interior, which is characterised by mountain chains and rugged peaks, is covered with ice, and is sending down glaciers to the coast, where they come under the influence of the warmth generated by the Gulf Stream and rapidly melt. The result is that the constant rush of torrents from the melting glaciers and snowfields is carving out valleys and river-ways, and stripping away mountain sides to make coastal plains so rapidly as to form an admirable object-lesson of physical geography in the making.

During the season Sir Martin Conway and his companions spent on the island they set a record for energy and achievement. They spent thirty-six days in the interior, sleeping either in small tents or in the open, the one being little different to the other, for the tents never kept the rain out and rarely the snow. Then they voyaged in a twelve-ton steamer up and down the coast for a distance of something like a thousand miles, though the steamer cabin was so small a place that when all the five members of the party were down below together, only one of them could stand up at a time. By the date their trip had ended they had crossed the island four times, had made thirteen mountain ascents, had made a rough survey of six hundred square miles of country, had steamed a thousand miles among heavy ice along coasts, through straits, and up bays, for the most part never before visited, and had located innumerable streams, hills, and glaciers.

More romantic and mysterious, but less replete with scientific value, ranks the expedition of Herr Andrée, perhaps the most novel of all Arctic expeditions, inasmuch as it was undertaken by balloon. The idea which actuated Herr Andrée in his enterprise was to utilise the current of air which, in July, almost invariably blows over Dane's Island to the North. Being an experienced balloonist, he realised that, could he once rise into that current in a balloon, he would be carried right across the Polar region in a few days. From the balloon car he would be able to observe the character of the region below him, and set at rest the question whether perpetual ice, open water, or land, occupied the extreme northerly spot of the world's surface.

With two companions, Dr. Strindberg and Herr Fraenkel, and a specially prepared balloon, an attempt was made to get away in July 1896, but was unsuccessful, and the start was postponed for a year. In July 1897 the members of the expedition were again ready, and on July 11 they were cut loose and floated away out of sight to the North. Since then no authentic news has been heard of them.

They went away prepared to face a long detention in the frozen world. In the car of the balloon they carried weapons, ammunition, and material wherewith to build a shelter, should the balloon collapse and leave them on the ice. An aluminium boat was also carried, so that the party could escape by sea if necessary. Several carrier pigeons were taken, and were to be liberated at intervals on the passage; but although one pigeon is said to have been shot in the Far North, it is doubtful whether it was one of the Andrée birds.

The balloon, when it went out of sight, was travelling at a speed which would have carried it over the Pole in a few days, and probably have enabled it to descend in Siberia in about a week. For the first fortnight after it had started, therefore, interest all over the world was keenly excited for further news. But the fortnight passed without any reliable intelligence being received, and a month followed, and so on until a year had gone by. Then relief and search parties were talked about, and the Swedish Geographical Society sent one out to look for the missing balloonists in Siberia. It did not meet with Andrée, nor did it obtain any reliable information respecting him. News was certainly published in every civilised country to the effect that some outlying hunting tribes had come upon a huge bag, having a mass of cordage attached to it, together with the remains of some human bodies. The Russian, Swedish, and Norwegian Governments immediately sent forward auxiliary search parties, but their only success was to trace the origin of the report, and find that a Siberian trader had, in a moment of mischievous humour, hoaxed a too confiding telegraph agent.

Later, on September 12th, 1899, a Swedish sloop, the Martha, reached Hammerfest with the information that a buoy, branded with the name of the Andrée expedition, had been found to the north-east of King Charles Islands. The buoy had lost the screw plug from the top, and had been so damaged by coming in contact with some hard substance that the interior cylinder was too dented to permit of an examination being made of the inside.

Andrée was well supplied with these buoys, and at any time one may be discovered containing a record of his doings from the moment he disappeared with his balloon sailing towards the north. It is not likely; it is scarcely probable that any sign will ever be discovered of the balloon or its occupants. For years the frozen North held all traces of the Franklin expedition from the eyes of the searchers who were able to conduct their operations along the route they knew Franklin had followed. No search party can knowingly follow the route Andrée and his comrades took. Their fate will probably be for ever a mystery, for so many things might have happened that no one theory can claim for itself more probability than another. All that is certain is that the party went out of sight drifting towards the north. They carried their lives in their hands, and knew that they did so. Had they succeeded, they would have achieved a mighty triumph; they failed, and in doing so set their names as indelibly on the scroll of Fame as any hero who has laid down his life in the contest with the measureless mystery of the Pole.

CHAPTER X THE POLAR METEORITES

Eskimo Iron—A Mystery of 1818—Search and Failure—Peary and his Huskies—The Secret revealed—An Eskimo Legend—At the Iron Mountain—Removing the Trophies—A Massive Giant—Attack and Defence—The Giant Objects—A Narrow Escape—Conquered.

When Captain Ross was in the Arctic regions in the year 1818, he encountered, in Melville Bay, a tribe of Eskimos who lived near Cape York, entirely cut off from communication with all other tribes, and who had not, so far as he could learn, ever met white men before. He was, therefore, astounded to find them in possession of iron implements. These consisted of rudely made knives, the cutting edges of which were fashioned out of very hard iron; harpoons and spears, tipped with iron points. Questioning the natives as to how they had become possessed of the iron, they explained that it had been obtained from what they termed the "iron mountain" on the coast near the bay. Ross sought for the mountain, and tried to induce the Eskimo to tell him exactly where it was situated, but failed in each case. He secured some of the iron knives and spear heads, and, on his return to Great Britain, the articles were submitted to analysis, when the metal was found to contain a percentage of nickel mixed with the iron.

Considerable curiosity was excited over the matter, and every succeeding British exploration party proceeding to the Arctic kept a sharp lookout for any trace of iron in the possession of Eskimo which could not have been obtained from whalers or visiting ships, as well as making every inquiry in order to ascertain where the mysterious iron mountain was situated. In no instance were they successful, and the question where the Cape York Eskimo had obtained their supply of iron became one of the riddles of the North.

When Peary went to the neighbourhood of Cape York to establish the station from whence he started on his brilliant march across the ice-cap, he came closely in contact with the tribe of Eskimo living there. The members of this tribe, isolated from the world and out of communication with all their kindred tribes, were, he felt assured, the descendants of those with whom Ross was associated earlier in the century. In his successive visits to the place Peary became on very friendly terms with the people, and gained their confidence in a way that no other explorer had yet done. This is hardly to be wondered at, when it is remembered that his presence among them, from time to time, raised them from the stress of hardship and poverty, often starvation itself, into a happy, well-to-do, and, for an Eskimo tribe, prosperous community. When he first went among them, the man who owned a wooden shaft for his harpoon was regarded as a rich man, while the woman who had a steel sail-needle was an heiress for whose hand the bravest and best strove in fierce rivalry. The possession of a gun was beyond the wildest dreams of the most imaginative, just as the possession of a steel knife was the highest glory to which ambition aspired. When Peary left his encampment, at the end of his first visit, the timber of the house and fittings left behind alone made the tribe wealthy, for they believed the world must have been ransacked to bring so much wood together; while the distribution of needles, knives, scissors, and such like trifles, changed the whole status of the people and made them rich beyond their fondest hopes.

On the next visit, Peary took some guns and ammunition for the leading men of the tribe, and there was then nothing they were not prepared to do for their benefactor. They worked, hunted, acted as guides, porters—anything, in fact, the white men wanted them to do. It was at this time Peary sought for information about the mysterious iron mountain, and, as may be expected, got it.

First he was told the story of the origin of the iron, a story they had had from their fathers, as those fathers, in their turn, had had it from theirs. The iron lay across the bay where a high peak stood out against the sky, pointing the way to the Saviksoahs. These—the "Iron Ones"—rested on the mountain where they had fallen, ages and ages ago, when they were thrown out of their village in the sky by Tornarsuk, the enemy. There were three of them, a man, a woman, and a dog. The man was deep in the ground, the woman partly so, and the dog lay on the surface. As the woman fell, she sat up, and her head had first been seen. A strange tribe came over the ice one year and, in greed, broke off the head and sought to carry it away with them in their kayaks, so that they should have a store of the iron always with them. But Tornarsuk would not allow this to be, and as soon as the kayaks, lashed together to make them strong enough to carry the head, were out in deep water, the head plunged through them, sinking out of sight and smashing the kayaks so that the men who were in them barely escaped with their lives. After that no one tried to take away a larger supply of iron than they actually wanted for knives and harpoon tips. Later, when whaler and other ships came to the seas in the summer time, there was no need to go to the Saviksoahs for iron, though all the tribes knew where they were.

In the spring of 1894 Peary induced one of the tribe to lead him to the place where the Saviksoahs were. The journey led them to a hill, on the summit of which there was an overhanging mass of rock which justified the Eskimo description of it. Describing the discovery, Peary wrote: "After passing some five hundred yards up a narrow valley, Tallakotteah began looking about until a bit of blue trap-rock, projecting above the snow, caught his eyes. Kicking aside the snow, he exposed more pieces, saying this was a pile of the stones used in pounding fragments from the iron mountain. He then indicated a spot four or five feet distant, as the location of the long-sought object. Returning to the sledge for the saw-knife, he began excavating the snow, and at last, after digging a pit, some three feet deep and five feet in diameter, just at 5.30 Sunday morning, May 27, 1894, the brown mass, rudely awakened from its winter sleep, found, for the first time in its cycles of existence, the eyes of a white man gazing upon it."

This was "the woman," a mass of meteoric iron weighing, as was subsequently proved, three tons. Originally it was said to have been twice that size, the removal of the "head" having considerably reduced it, while in addition there had been generations of Eskimo chipping it for knives and spear tips. The amount of iron which had been broken from it in this way was shown by the pile of stones lying around it. The Eskimo maintained that these stones had all been brought there by the men who came for iron; but if that were true, the Saviksoah must have been chipped for ages, judging by the accumulation of stones.

About thirty yards away from the "woman" there lay the "dog," a smaller mass weighing only half a ton. The "man" was some miles away, as became his dignity and size, for he was found to be a mighty mass, one hundred tons in weight, rugged in form, and so intractable when attempts were made to move him, that his removal forms a tale so full of romance as almost to suggest fiction.

As it was late in the season when Peary's ship, the Kite, arrived, there was only time to remove the "woman" and the "dog," the "man" being located but untouched pending the return of another season. The removal of the "dog" did not offer any great difficulty, and the "woman" was levered out of the ground and conveyed to the ship on rollers without giving more than the ordinary amount of trouble experienced in handling heavy masses of inert material. Not so the "man."

With the two smaller meteorites safely conveyed to New York, a return of the Kite to Melville Island to effect the removal of the "man" was arranged. Accompanied by a party of scientists and an engineer, Peary sailed north the following year and immediately attacked the problem of excavating and placing on the Kite the largest of the three masses. The exact size was not at the time known, but as soon as the work of excavation commenced it was obvious that the task in hand was much greater than was anticipated. The portion first revealed was found to be four feet in length, two feet high, and one and a half feet broad. This, however, was merely a fin-like excrescence on the main mass, which, as the excavation proceeded, was shown to measure twelve feet long by eight feet in width, on the upper face, while a trench three feet round it did not reach to the base. It was then realised that the task of transferring such a huge mass from the place where it lay in the ground to the ship was one requiring great engineering skill and the use of appliances of much greater strength than the Kite had brought with her. The mass was about three hundred yards from high-water mark and eighty feet above it. A shelf of rock ran out into the sea immediately below the spot where the meteorite reposed, and the water was sufficiently deep alongside the shelf to make it a natural pier or wharf where the ship could make fast for the mass to be loaded on board, when it had been moved from its resting-place and conveyed to the edge of the sea. While the rocky pier was all that could be desired from the point of view of loading, it was entirely unprotected from the ice which, in the early approach of winter, rapidly accumulated in the bay. It was clear, therefore, that the removal and shipment of the mass must be carried out with rapidity if all risk of disaster were to be avoided.

By the time the mass had been excavated and its full dimensions were revealed, the season was too far advanced for any serious attempt being made to get it on board the ship. It was estimated to weigh not less than one hundred tons, while the rugged and angular form it presented made it an extremely difficult object to handle. All the time available was devoted to making the preliminary arrangements for the definite work of removal in the following season, and, as soon as the ice began to gather in the bay, the Kite sailed back to the south. The meteorite being so much larger than was anticipated, a larger vessel than the Kite was required to convey it to New York; it was also necessary to have still heavier appliances wherewith to handle it.

The following year, on board the Hope, Peary returned to the attack and set to work to carry off his treasure. With the aid of the male members of the Eskimo tribe, in addition to the men he had with him and the crew of the steamer, the plan of operations was commenced. As Peary wrote, in describing the experience: "The first thing to be done was to tear the heavenly visitor from its frozen bed of centuries, and, as it rose inch by inch under the resistless lift of the hydraulic jacks, gradually displaying its ponderous sides, it grew upon us as Niagara grows upon the observer, and there was not one of us unimpressed by the enormousness of this lump of metal. The expressions of the Eskimo about the Saviksoah (Great Iron) were low but earnest, and it, and the other wonderful 'Great Irons' (the jacks) which could tear it from its bed, awed them to the utmost."

When it was out of the nest where it had rested so long, the method adopted was to tilt it up from one side, by means of the jacks and steel cables, until it stood on end, and then to force it over until its own weight made it fall forward. The spectacle, as it fell, brought home to the onlookers the enormous power it represented. As it slowly moved, the stones lying immediately under it were ground into powder, and, as it lurched forward, the hard masses of rock were rent and split, while a shower of sparks burst from the meteorite itself wherever it came in contact with a more than usually hard piece of rock. The irregularities in its form added to the difficulties, for it was almost impossible to secure firm holds for the jacks, and anything approaching a slip on the part of the mass was tantamount to death or destruction to any one within reach of it. Day and night the struggle went on, the mass seeming to resist every inch of the way, settling itself into awkward corners and crevices; cutting its way, as it fell, through the baulks of timber set to form a bed for it; bending and notching steel rails, when they were substituted for the wood; and generally giving as much trouble as it was possible to give, almost to the extent of suggesting conscious design. Hard as every one worked to win, the meteorite proved too much for them, and it was only conveyed as far as the rocky pier where the ship lay ready to take it on board when the ice came drifting into the bay, and for another winter the meteorite had to be left in its frozen habitat.

"It was the last night of our stay at the island," Peary wrote, "a night of such savage wildness as is possible only in the Arctic regions.... The wild gale was howling out of the depths of Melville Bay through the Hope's rigging and the snow was driving in horizontal lines. The white slopes of the hill down which the meteorite had been brought showed a ghastly grey through the darkness; the fire, round which the fur-clad forms of the Eskimo were grouped, spread its bright red glare for a short distance; a little to one side was a faint glow of light through the skin wall of a solitary tupik. Working about the meteorite was my own little party, and, in the foreground, the central figure, the raison d'être of it all, the 'Saviksoah,' the 'Iron Mountain,' towering above the human figures about it and standing out, black and uncompromising. While everything else was buried in snow, the Saviksoah was unaffected. The great flakes vanished as they touched it, and the effect was very impressive. It was as if the giant were saying, 'I am apart from all things; I am heaven-born, and still carry in my heart some of the warmth of those long-gone days before I was hurled upon this frozen desert.' To strengthen this fancy that the meteorite still held some of its celestial fire and feeling, if a sledge, ill aimed in the darkness at wedge or block, chanced to strike it, a spouting jet of scintillating sparks lit the gloom, and a deep note, sonorous as a bell, a Polar tocsin, or the half-pained, half-enraged bellow of a lost soul, answered the blow."

Yet another year—1897—saw Peary again at work, this time with the meteorite ready alongside the natural wharf. It was the month of August that the Hope made fast opposite the meteorite, but already the ice had begun to drift into the bay, as though even that were going to dispute the right of man to carry off the mighty trophy. Without loss of a day, work was commenced and a bridge of huge timbers was constructed along which to warp the mass from the shore on to the ship. The bridge completed, forty-eight hours were consumed in getting the mass on to it. The pressure of its enormous weight put so great a strain on the woodwork that it visibly gave as the mass came on to it, and more than once a collapse seemed imminent. Once a slip of less than an inch upset the equilibrium of everything to such an extent that the stays and supports were apparently within an ace of giving way. It was a curious coincidence that this single slip occurred at a moment and a place where, had anything given way, there was nothing to prevent the mass rolling over the edge of the rock and sinking, presumably for ever, into deep water. As it turned out, the slip was taken up in time to avert disaster, and thereafter the mass was forced, slowly but surely, on to the deck of the ship.

The Eskimo were greatly disturbed at the spectacle of the meteorite passing from the shore to the ship. They all left the vessel, saying that even if it was forced on to the deck, directly it arrived there it would smash its way through the vessel and plunge into the sea, carrying the ship and all on board with it. From the time work was recommenced on the task of removing the mass, storms and gales had persisted and the sun had not been seen. The Eskimo were, therefore, deeply impressed when, just as the Saviksoah reached the planking arranged for it above the main hold and the tackles were cast loose, the sun shone out, a ray falling from behind a cloud directly on the meteorite and changing it from the dull brown-hued mass into a gleaming bronze.

As though it had yielded itself to the inevitable, the meteorite gave no further trouble. It was gradually lowered into the hold and wedged so tightly into position that it was impossible for it to move, however much the ship rolled or pitched. Fortunate it was this work was so well done, for when the return journey was commenced the Hope had to fight her way through a series of the most severe gales and storms that any on board had experienced. The meteorite had yielded, but the Spirit of the Arctic evidently had serious objections to it being carried off. But the years of persistent effort had won. The mysterious source of the ancient Eskimo iron had been discovered, and, at the same time, the greatest meteorite the world was known to contain was revealed. It was a fitting result that the trophy should be carried from the darkness of the Arctic into the light of civilisation.

CHAPTER XI THE SECOND VOYAGE OF THE FRAM

Norwegian Enterprise—Mapping the Islands—Nearly Frozen—A Novel Warming-Pan—Eskimo Melody—Arctic Bull Fights—Death of the Doctor—Fire on the Fram—New Lands—Prehistoric People.

The expedition which formed the second visit of the Fram to the Arctic regions was equipped by private Norwegian enterprise, and sailed from Larvick on June 24, 1898, the day known in Norway as St. Hans Day. The party consisted of sixteen, all told, under the command of Captain Sverdrup, who, with two other members of the party, were in the Fram with Nansen on her previous voyage. The plan of operations was to proceed to the most southerly point of Greenland, sail to the north along the western coast to Smith Sound, where the ship was to push as far to the north as possible and form a headquarters, whence sledge expeditions were to be sent out in all directions to explore and survey the immediate locality, and, at the same time, to observe and record all natural phenomena of a scientific nature. As to the exact localities to which chief attention was to be paid, the commander of the expedition was to use his own judgment; but on one point the instructions were definite and emphatic—there was to be no attempt at a dash for the Pole.

On August 21 the Fram reached a suitable place for winter quarters. On the way along the Greenland coast the explorers had to take on board dogs for the sledge teams, and also to obtain a store of walrus meat wherewith to feed them, so that it was not until the date mentioned they were able to reach Rice Strait, which afforded them all the facilities they needed for winter quarters. As Peary was already to the north, engaged in mapping out the land in that direction, the Norwegians decided to give their attention to the land lying on the western side of the Strait, in the vicinity of Hayes Sound, where Nares, in 1875, had done considerable work. They completed the survey of the coast line running round Robeson Channel, and, during their stay, not only mapped out an area of one hundred thousand square miles, but also located hitherto undiscovered land, which was named after King Oscar of Norway and taken possession of in his name. Valuable additions were also made to the zoological, geological, meteorological, and botanical records, while the story of the expedition abounds in interesting experiences.

The sun set on October 16 for the remainder of the winter. A party was out taking observations over some mountains behind the bay in which the Fram was anchored, and had returned to camp for the evening meal as the sun was going down. One of the party drew the attention of the others to it, and they gathered at the door of the tent and watched it in silence. "We were looking at the sun for the last time that year," Captain Sverdrup wrote in his account of the expedition. "Its pale light lay dying over the 'inland ice'; its disc, light red, was veiled on the horizon; it was like a day in the land of the dead. All light was so hopelessly cold; all life so far away. We stood and watched it till it sank; then everything became so still that it made one shudder—as if the Almighty had deserted us and shut the gates of Heaven. The light died away across the mountains and slowly vanished, while over us crept the great shades of the Polar night, the night that kills all life."

With a stretch of four months' darkness before them, it was impossible to avoid recalling the records of others who had gone through the lonely period of darkness and cold. It was a disquieting subject. Franklin, with 138 men under his command, had seen the sun go down into the Polar night, and not a man of all the party had lived to tell the tale. Greely, with twenty-five men, had seen the silent darkness come on near where they were situated at the moment—six had lived to see the dawn. Nordenskjold, wintering in White Bay, had seventeen men die of scurvy, with an abundance of food around them, for when the last victim was found, lying where he fell, he had a piece of salt pork still clutched in his fingers, while in the camp there were scores of tins of preserved fresh meat unopened. True it was that science, since then, had made vast strides, and prejudice and ignorance had been largely overcome; but when men find themselves absolutely cut off from all communication with the outside world, and with all sorts of possible dangers and disasters hidden in the future, it is only the fool-hardy who fails to realise them. The brave man does not shut his eyes to dangers; he looks them squarely in the face and determines to overcome them. Such a man usually wins. It is the man who shuts his eyes to what is in front of him who is defeated.

The winter passed without any fatality among them, although there was an occasion when one of the members nearly came to his end. Various trips were taken when the moon was up to try and locate the site where Greely made his historic camp on Pim Island. In February two men set out to look for it, and, as they did not intend to be long away, they took neither food nor sleeping-bags with them. The weather was clear and cold, with the thermometer at -40° Fahr., but the men experienced no ill effects from it on their journey. They found some pieces of rope and sail-cloth scattered about at a spot on the north side of the island, and came to the conclusion that this must have been the site of the camp. Having examined the place, they were about to return to the Fram, when one of them sank to the ground. His companion strove to lift him up, but without avail; he had suddenly become exhausted, and his strength gave out so entirely that he could not remain on his feet. It was a serious situation. A few hours of inactivity in such a temperature, without an excess of fur clothing and warm food, meant freezing to death. His companion was in doubt whether to wait and strive to rouse him, or to run to the ship for help. He adopted the latter course, and sped away as fast as his legs could carry him. Arrived at the Fram, he raised the alarm, and every one turned out and hastened to the rescue. A sledge was quickly harnessed to a dog team, and on it were placed furs and food. The place where the man had collapsed was about a mile away, and the rescuers were soon at his side. He lay in a heap on the frozen snow, too far gone to recognise any one. He was pushed into a sleeping-bag, placed on the sledge, and driven off at top speed to the ship, where he was promptly put into his bunk and restoratives administered to him. Soon the efforts were successful, and he sank into a sleep from which he awakened, many hours after, little the worse for his adventure. He escaped without even a touch of frost-bite.

A few days after this episode the temperature fell rapidly, until the thermometer registered as low as -58° Fahr. Peary, the American explorer, was at the time some fifteen miles to the north of the Fram, and the temperature in his locality went down to -67° Fahr., a cold so intense that, hardened as he was to the rigours of Arctic weather, he had seven toes so severely frost-bitten that they had to be amputated. A small party from the Fram was out on the ice at the time, and the cold was so trying to them that they squeezed into their sleeping-bags clad, as they were, in heavy fur garments. Still they were unable to get warm, so they lit their oil stove to raise the temperature in the tent. While this was being done, one man complained bitterly of the cold in his back, and a comrade, seeking a cause for it, found that the moisture from his body had turned to white frost on the inside of his thick woollen jersey. To thaw it, they put the lighted stove between the jersey and the man's back, whereupon he exclaimed, "Ah, that's not quite so cold."

Yet the way in which mankind can adapt themselves to all varieties of climate, by use and custom, was shown by a visit they had from one of Peary's Eskimo. He reached the Fram on a day when the temperature was at -40° Fahr. Invited on board, he said he must first change his travelling clothes, and, in the open air, he stripped to the waist to remove his heavy furs and put on a lighter suit. He was apparently as unaffected by the intense cold on his naked flesh as one of the Norwegians would have been had the thermometer stood at forty degrees above instead of forty degrees below zero.

The visit of the Eskimo proved an enjoyable break to the explorers, though their generosity in giving him presents, at the time of his departure, resulted in so many more coming to visit them that they had rather too much of a good thing. But when he first arrived the visitor was peculiarly welcome. They entertained him to various amusements, commencing with dinner and concluding with a concert. To the latter the Eskimo contributed his share. He was greatly taken with a toy drum belonging to one of the party, and played his own idea of a melody upon it. As his hosts did not manifest any displeasure at his performances—whatever they may have felt—he became bolder and offered to sing them a song.

To the accompaniment of the drum, he commenced with a weird, wild wail, which gradually developed in volume of sound and variety of intonation until the listeners began to feel shivers running up and down their spines. At that point the singer, who had so far sat rigid, began to sway his body from side to side, while he tossed his head backwards and forwards. He had long dank black hair, and, as he moved quicker and quicker, in time with the drum and the staccato wails, his hair was tossed over his face until the features were obscured. This appeared to be the critical moment in the performance, for he raised himself from his seat, and, with his hair tossing, his voice wailing, his body swaying, and his hands thumping vigorously at the drum, he completed the discomfiture of his hosts, who, disposed to smile at the beginning of the performance, were distinctly uncomfortable at the finish. The performer, however, was by no means dissatisfied with himself. He was a great singer, he told them, perhaps the greatest in the tribe. They had only to ask some of the others of his tribe to sing to realise the truth of what he said, he added. But the Norwegians were satisfied with the one experience.