6o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



to the polar sea beyond. Heavy pack-ice stopped his advance in 82 11' 

 N. latitude. His vessel, the Polaris, wintered under an enormous 

 floeberg in 81 37' north. Before winter really set in Hall journeyed 

 by sledge northwards to the 82d parallel, and there saw land on the 

 west side of Eobeson Strait, extending north, as far as he could judge 

 and subsequent observations practically confirmed his estimate to 

 about 83 05' N. During the winter Hall died, and the other members 

 of the expedition only escaped after experiencing a succession of 

 disasters. 



But the success which had attended the efforts of the expedition 

 to reach a high northern latitude and the other valuable geographical 

 results obtained, roused a spirit of emulation in this country. In 

 1875 was despatched the famous Xares expedition, in the Alert and the 

 Discovery. They found all plain sailing as far as Cape Sabine, but 

 beyond that point the ice conditions were as unfavorable to an advance 

 northwards as Hall had found them favorable. By degrees, however, 

 the Alert and the Discovery made their way along the "West Greenland 

 coast past Cape Lieber and across Lady Franklin Bay to Discovery Har- 

 bor. Here the Discovery wintered, but Nares, pushing north in the Alert, 

 managed before the close of the summer to advance a step nearer the 

 Pole than any who had previously followed the Smith Sound route. 

 His winter station on the edge of the Polar Sea was in 82 25' 1ST. But 

 even this high northing was not to mark the limit of the expedition's 

 success that year. Lieutenant Pelham Aldrich, whilst in command 

 of a sledging party, reached on September 25, 1875, latitude 8248' 

 north, on the coast of Grinnell Land, and established what was then 

 a world's record. In the following summer Aldrich was yet more 

 successful, passing round the north end of Grinnell Land from Cape 

 Columbia, in 83 07' north, to Cape Alfred Ernest, in 82 16' north. 

 Meanwhile Commander A. H. Markham was attaining still higher 

 latitudes. After following the coast to Cape Henry, in 82 5 5' N., 

 Markham struck across the ice-bound Polar Sea in a direct attempt 

 to reach the North Pole. He was accompanied by seventeen men, with 

 two sledges, and after almost superhuman exertions reached a latitude 

 of 8320'. On the valuable work accomplished in other directions it is 

 not now our purpose to dilate. It is curious to note, however, when 

 one bears subsequent expeditions in mind, that the Nares expedition, 

 successful as it undoubtedly was, was supposed to have closed that 

 particular route to the Pole. "To send another expedition in that 

 direction would," it was declared, "be a waste of money and energy." 

 In spite of this dictum, the Greely Expedition, sent north by the United 

 States Government as a result of the International Polar Conferences 

 of 1879-80, made its way up Smith Sound in 1881. The expedition 

 remained in the polar regions three years, and carried out a series of 



