Polar exploration

“ Modern Polar exploration must be conducted in this manner. Having decided whether one's energies are to be applied to the Arctic or Antarctic Regions, the explorer has to make up his mind whether it be land or sea that he is about to explore, and, having determined that, and being well acquainted with the literature of his subject, and having had previous practical training in the work he is about to undertake, he chooses his definite area. ”

“ Polar exploration is at once the cleanest and most isolated way of having a bad time which has been devised. ”

“ But modern Polar exploration, especially in Antarctic seas, with the tendency to explore more thoroughly definite areas, by vessels carrying on board a much larger number and more highly trained staffs of naturalists, to whom better opportunities are being given to carry out their special work, has rather revealed the fact that such similarities which could support the theory of bipolarity do not occur. ”

“ In fact, in Polar exploration especially, people are beginning to see the comparative uselessness of such journeys, and rarely can any Polar expedition get money unless the leader announces that such and such scientific investigations are to be made by a staff of experts, and that such and such scientific results are likely to accrue. ”

“ I am convinced that men engaged in polar exploration should be clothed as lightly as possible, even if they are in danger of being frost-bitten when they halt on the march. We owe many grudges against the glacier which caused us so many difficulties, but my chief one now is that we brought back no photographs of a very interesting portion of it. This was due to the facts that we expected to take as many photographs as we had plates to spare on our return journey, and that when we returned we were so short of food that we could not afford the time to unpack the camera. ”

“ It is also dangerous at the present time to formulate general statements regarding the distribution and general laws which regulate this host of living beings, as Polar exploration is as yet in its infancy, as far as serious research in this subject is concerned. ”

“ For the scientist it is not the benefit of commerce which makes the importance of geographical exploration, it is the new material added to our stock of knowledge which enables us to make new comparisons and to reach a more thorough understanding of the world. If we intend to prove the necessity of new polar explorations, we do not need to dwell upon the many observations which are connected with Arctic research. If we should enter more closely into the meteorological and hydrographical or the magnetical problems which may be understood better by researches in regions near the pole ”

“ We propose to institute a comparison between the modes of traveling past and present, and to describe the work that will fall to the lot of an exploring expedition during the space of twelve months. The best route for polar exploration is the one that has been so unanimously advocated by all arctic authorities both of our own and other countries, and the one that is to be adopted by the expedition about to leave our shores. There are many reasons why the route via Smith Sound is superior to and more advantageous for polar exploration than any other. ”

“ The study of tides is an important part of Polar exploration, and their study in Antarctic Regions more generally useful than in the Arctic Regions, for in the Great Southern Ocean lie the original tides of the world. ”

“ The great maxim to follow in Polar exploration as regard food supplies is to live as far as possible on the products of the sea or land where the work of the expedition lies. If the expedition is exploring in the Antarctic Regions, let it feed on the excellent flesh of the seals and fish which can be got plentifully there, and on the eggs and flesh of the innumerable penguins and other birds. ”

“ At the same time let us ask, What is the object of polar expeditions? It is the thorough exploration of the Arctic region and of all its phenomena, a great task which will give scientists work for years to come. The problems will not be solved by pushing north and gaining the pole. There are many more objects of study left besides, and it is not necessary at all to work with all our might for the achievement of this single aim. The desires of humanity and the wants of science both direct us the same way. ”

“ Hence the study of the physics of the oceans as a whole is most important, and it becomes the duty of a Polar explorer to carry on that research in the Polar seas. The first essential in any form of oceanic research, after knowing one's position on the earth's surface, is to know the depth, and if this has not already been determined one must take a "sounding." ”

“ In extending the scope of the present book to touch on polar exploration, it seems well to post the reader at the very beginning on the striking antitheses of natural conditions, apparently known to only a few even among the best read and most intelligent people, existing at those mathematical points, the north and south poles, where the earth’s axis intersects the surface of the earth. ”

“ The possibility of the drift passing over the route suggested by Nansen was not gainsaid by those whose close knowledge of Arctic problems, and desire for general information, made them more tolerant than the keen opponents of the scheme—the latter, strangely enough, being men whose own exploits had not been the most successful in Polar exploration. The hero of the Alert sledge journey admitted the feasibility of the drift theory, but shook his head at the idea of any ship withstanding the winter pressure of the great ice packs in the far North. ”

“ Many of the explorers, or those who planned the expeditions, were often more anxious to find sensational results than to further science. Polar exploration is now mostly considered merely the ambitious struggle of expeditions to get a few miles farther north than all the former explorers. ”

“ From this it will be seen that sea ice especially, and even the surface of glacier ice is swarming with life, and is by no means so sterile as it is usually thought to be. Bacteriological examination has demonstrated that the air of the Polar Regions is sterile, but under natural conditions in the Polar Regions, as in other regions, we may lay down a general law, and say—Where there is water there is life! ”

“ Such an expedition will give a very complete idea of the meteorology and magnetism of the South Polar Regions in all western longitudes, and in meteorology especially is required a systematic and synchronous series of observations such as are here indicated.
The world shrinks, but, after all, this is only from the point of view of those who do not look into futurity. Each scientific investigation leads to the discovery of new scientific facts and problems not only unknown, but often entirely unconceived. ”

“ A proper conception of the bathymetry of Polar seas is necessary for an adequate discussion of physical problems connected with the temperature, salinity, specific gravity and circulation, and the effect of wind, air-temperature and other phenomena that affect these seas. The physical problems of ice-covered seas are much more complicated than in seas where there is no ice, because, as we have seen previously, when the surface of the sea is being frozen over, the salt in that part of the water which is changed into ice is thrown out and must therefore make the neighbouring water more saline ”

“ With fine courses, such as those that are necessary for the high speeds attained, with the great value of these modern leviathans, with valuable cargoes, and with a thousand or more human beings on board, it will be seen how important an accurate knowledge of terrestrial magnetism is.
There is no more striking or wonderful phenomenon in the Polar Regions than the aurora—Aurora Borealis in the north and Aurora Australis in the south. Any one who has wintered in the Arctic Regions has had good opportunity of witnessing the aurora in all its splendour. ”

“ One thing is perfectly clear, and that is that there is an immense field for most interesting exploration of the most useful kind open to those who wish to explore in the South Polar Regions. There is no form of exploration more fascinating and more important than oceanography—physical and biological—in any part of the world, and in no region is it more interesting and important to carry on these investigations than in the seas round about the South Pole. Interesting as is the exploration of Antarctic lands, the exploration of Antarctic seas is not less so. ”

“ While it is melting it takes all the heat available and so preserves the fresh-water ice, which melts after all the salt-water ice is gone. In old hummocky ice this process of purification has been going on intermittently whenever the weather was warm enough. I trust I have made these matters plain, but it is impossible by words to give a true idea of the marvellous colour and beauty of the ice in polar seas, or of its irresistible power when driven hither and thither by sea and wind. There can be no more terrific experience than a storm in a living polar pack. ”

“ Our present knowledge of the glacial system, which, at some distant time, covered not only the poles, but the lands we now inhabit, would not have been conceivable without a knowledge of the present polar ice. Who will say that new gems will not be added to the annals of science by antarctic explorers?
Specifically, terrestrial magnetism, geography, meteorology, geology, and oceanography are to be most enriched by the results of far southern exploration. Magnetism has an important bearing upon the navigation of the southern hemisphere, and even upon the land surveys. ”

“ The reason is not far to seek, for to the depth of a fathom or so the sea becomes frozen solidly during the winter, and when summer comes and the pack breaks up, this and even heavier ice is driven along the shore and grinds over the rocks, rubbing and polishing them and preventing seaweed from growing there. Naturally also, for the same reason, one need not expect to find shore animals, and, as a matter of fact, shore fauna is very scanty in the Polar Regions. ”

“ Therefore he naturally begins his account of the natural features of the planet by a description of these polar snow caps, their formation and melting. In doing so he cannot resist a sarcastic reference to the endless enthusiasm, useless expenditure of money and labor, and the scientific futility of arctic exploration.
“Polar expeditions exert an extreme attraction on certain minds, perhaps because they combine the maximum of hardship with the minimum of headway. Inconclusiveness certainly enables them to be constantly renewed, without loss either of purpose or prestige. ”

“ Those of greater bulk, taking the ground, offer a resistance against which the lesser masses can only strain and grind; but away out in the unfathomable depths of the Polar Sea there is no chance of the [Pg 192] ice ever grounding. It is always floating, and so always susceptible to the force of wind, tide, and current. Consequently it is always moving and feeling the pressure of the water below, of the grinding strain of the drift, and of the surface disturbances brought about by the constant displacement. ”

“ The most frequent form is a low arch of more or less elliptical form, rising not many degrees above the horizon to the north-west. On more than one occasion I have seen perfect coronas with their waving bands of streamers darting out from the zenith at times almost to the horizon. All the displays that I have seen on Ben Nevis had the streamers lighted with that lurid pale yellowish-green colour that every Arctic explorer is familiar with, but on one occasion at least there were mingled with it flashes of rosy red, which passed along the living bands. ”

“ In the long winter nights the aurora borealis glares and blazes in the sky, "roaring and flashing about a ship enough to frighten a fellow," as an old quartermaster, who was with Sir F. L. McClintock in his search for Sir John Franklin, used to tell the midshipmen. In the prolonged sunset and sunrise the sky is ablaze with colour, and, when the sun has gone, the rarefied atmosphere produces many curious astronomical figures. As explorers penetrated farther into the great ice-bound region they encountered fresh peculiarities. ”

“ Wind and weather may pack it closer together, the plastic new ice giving way with the old ice embedded in its matrix. The whole becomes a solid floe, and many floes unite and form great "fields" of ice. This field ice is more formidable than the fields and floes of new ice that are formed during a single winter, and which during the following summer are known by polar voyagers as "one-year ice." At the beginning of winter they may show a thickness of possibly five or perhaps ten feet, and in places there will be even thicker pieces. ”

“ In 1834 the Magnetic Association founded by Gauss and Weber, and the stations organised by Sabine in many British colonies, multiplied examples of the relationship of auroræ and disturbances in the three elements of terrestrial magnetism, viz., declination, inclination, and intensity. These observations showed at the same time the extreme complexity of the subject. Some of the most interesting observations that have been made actually within the Polar Regions are those of Weyprecht, in the Tegetthof expedition to Franz Josef Land. ”

“ This may increase in thickness up to, say, 3 or 4 inches. If wind arises and sea is thrown into waves, it is found that the crystals are all separate and that the bay ice or slush is quite mobile, but it is not so mobile as the water without crystals, the shape of the waves being less sharp. In fact, the waves have an oily motion in a slush-covered sea. If one tries to pull in a boat, the pulling is found to be very heavy, and even the way of a large ship with good steam power is seriously impeded. ”