50 Chapter I. 



Young and Leigh- Smith of England, Koldewey of 

 Germany, Payer of Austria, Nordenskiold of Sweden, 

 and Melville in our own country. I have no hesitation 

 in asserting that no two of these believe in the possibility 

 of Nansen's first proposition to build a vessel capable of 

 living or navigating- in a heavy Arctic pack, into which 

 it is proposed to put his ship. The second proposition 

 is even more hazardous, involving as it does a drift of 

 more than 2,000 miles in a straight line through an 

 unknown region, during which the party in its voyage 

 (lasting two or more years, we are told) would take only 

 boats along, encamp on an iceberg, and live there while 

 floating across." 



After this General Greely proceeds to prove the 

 falsity of all my assumptions. Respecting the objects 

 from the Jeannette, he says plainly that he does not 

 believe in them. " Probably some drift articles were 

 found," he says, "and it would seem more reasonable to 

 trace them to the Porteus, which was wrecked in Smith 

 Sound about 1,000 miles north of Julianehaab." . . 

 " It is further important to note that, if the articles were 

 really from the Jeannette, the nearest route would have 

 been, not across the North Pole along the east coast of 

 Greenland, but down Kennedy Channel and by way of 

 Smith Sound and Baffin Bay, as was suggested as to 

 drift from the Porteus." 



We could not possibly get near the Pole itself by a 

 long distance, says Greely, as "we know almost as well 



