INTRODUCTION xxix 



To make such an immense and entirely new addition 

 to his plans without asking leave! Some thought it 

 grand ; more thought it doubtful ; but there were many 

 who cried out that it was inadmissible, disloyal nay, 

 there were some who wanted to have him stopped. 

 But nothing of this reached him. He had steered his 

 course as he himself had set it, without looking back. 



Then by degrees it was forgotten, and everyone went 

 on with his own affairs. The mists were upon us day 

 after day, week after week the mists that are kind to 

 little men and swallow up all that is great and towers 

 above them. 



Suddenly a bright spring day cuts through the bank 

 of fog. There is a new message. People stop again 

 and look up. High above them shines a deed, a man. 

 A wave of joy runs through the souls of men; their 

 eyes are bright as the flags that wave about them. 



Why? On account of the great geographical dis- 

 coveries, the important scientific results? Oh no; that 

 will come later, for the few specialists. This is some- 

 thing all can understand. A victory of human mind 



/ 



and human strength over the dominion and powers of 

 Nature; a deed that lifts us above the grey monotony 

 of daily life; a view over shining plains, with lofty 

 mountains against the cold blue sky, and lands covered 

 by ice-sheets of inconceivable extent; a vision of long- 

 vanished glacial times; the triumph of the living over 

 the stiffened realm of death. There is a ring of steeled, 



