DRAMATIC ANNOUNCEMENTS OF COOK AND PEARY 23 



starvation. We must mention here another American, the still 

 more unfortunate DeLong, whose ship was sunk in the Siberian 

 seas, and who with many of his followers perished by starvation 

 on the bleak Siberian coast. 



This rapid resume of explorers' names and feats is given merely 

 by way of introduction, as the story of where they went and what 

 they achieved is given at length in the later sections of this work. 

 It is our purpose here merely to introduce them by name, and make 

 a running record of achievements up to the present year. To com- 

 plete the list given must be added a few other names, who bring the 

 roll up to our own immediate times. 



Chief among these were the following: Sir George Nares, an 

 English explorer, who followed the American route in 1876 and 

 reached latitude 83 degrees 20 minutes, the highest north of his 

 time. This was done by laying up his vessel in winter quarters and 

 sledging over the frozen waters north of Greenland. Then fol- 

 lowed the Austrian Payer, the discoverer of the Franz Josef Islands ; 

 Nordenskiold, who traversed the Northeast Passage; Andree, the 

 unfortunate, who perished in an attempt to reach the Pole in a 

 balloon ; Nansen, the Norwegian explorer, who let his ship be frozen 

 in the ice of the Siberian seas and sledged to latitude 86 degrees 14 

 minutes, a new "highest north." In 1900 came an Italian explorer 

 of royal descent, the Duke of the Abruzzi, who sent a sledge expe- 

 dition northward from the Franz Josef Islands and made a record 

 of 86 degrees 34 minutes, twenty geographical miles higher than 

 Nansen. The last two whom we shall name here were Norwegians, 

 Captain Sverdrup, who remained for years in the far north and 

 discovered new islands west of Greenland, and Captain Amundsen, 

 who completed the work of McClure in discovering the Northwest 

 Passage, and surpassed him by taking his ship through that long- 

 sought passage. The feats of all these adventurers will be given in 

 detail in later chapters. 



While the latter of those named were doing their work, the two 

 with whom we are specially concerned, Robert E. Peary and Fred- 



