154 PEARY'S FARTHEST NORTH OF 1905-6 



invalid, and after the "Windward" was reached and proper surgical 

 instruments obtained the operation had to be completed, a necessity 

 that involved another six weeks of illness. 



This accident put an end to any attempt upon the Pole in 1899, 

 but by April I9th Peary was on his feet again, sledging to Fort 

 Conger, killing and caching for future use twenty-five musk oxen 

 and making important explorations, in one of which he crossed the 

 ice-cap of Ellesmere Land, reaching an elevation of more than four 

 thousand feet and looking down on the snow-free western coast 

 of that large island the one which Dr. Cook crossed in the start of 

 his polar trip. An ice-free fiord was seen about fifty miles to the 

 northwest and beyond that more distant land. 



A second winter passed and the year 1900 came. Fort Conger 

 was sought again, being reached on March 28th. It was the pur- 

 pose of the explorer now to follow the northwest coast of Greenland 

 and settle the question definitely of the northern upreach of that 

 great island. For all that was then definitely known it might stretch 

 upward to continental dimensions or offer a pathway to the Pole. 

 In this expedition Peary was notably successful. On May 8th the 

 cairn left by Lockwood eighteen years before was reached, and 

 another march led the adventurer around Cape Washington, which 

 he had feared to be the northern point of Greenland. 



On rounding it he was gratified to see another splendid head- 

 land beyond, with two large glaciers debouching near it. He knew 

 now that the discovery of Greenland's northernmost cape was left 

 for him. Continuing the journey for several marches more, in 

 which they reeled ofif noble distances, the party reached a magnifi- 

 cent cape in the same latitude as Cape Washington. This was 

 named after one of the principal patrons of the expedition, Cape 

 Morris K. Jesup. 



The next two marches lay in a southeasterly direction, and 

 here, on May 22, 1900, Peary erected a cairn at what appeared to 

 be the most northeasterly point of the American half of the world. 



