RESCUE OF GREELY PARTY 215 



U. S. A., from his old friend and well wisher, the author, George W. Clark, 

 Detroit, Mich., 1861.' Lying in the stores was an ocarina, a musical instru- 

 ment, which was still good. Carved on it rudely with a knife was the latitude 

 at which Fort Conger had been established. 



"Stickpins and other articles of jewelry I found scattered around. It was 

 surprising to find the stores in such excellent condition. It only goes to show 

 the wonderful preservative qualities of the Arctic climate. Coffee I made 

 often from the abandoned Greely stores. One of the most striking relics I 

 found here, and one that showed the proclivities of the owner, was a record of 

 all the horse trotting events of the time in America. It had been written in the 

 owner's hand, and embodied a description and record of all the trotters and 

 trotting marks in the history of the turf. 



"It seemed that I was to be fortunate in discovering the abandoned camps 

 of previous expeditions. I went farther a little later and came across the camp 

 that had been established by Commodore Hall in 1881. This party had been 

 brought north by the United States steamship Polaris. Like the Greely steamer, 

 the Polaris was also crushed in the ice at Littleton Island. 



"Here I found a wooden house, 16 feet by 35, which had been erected as 

 a winter quarters. The house was still standing. 



"After the Polaris had been crushed, nineteen of the party took to the ice 

 cakes and tried to drift to safety. They were picked up by the Tigress off 

 Newfoundland after they had floated to the coast of Labrador, not a hundred 

 miles from here. The other members were rescued by the Ravenscrag of 

 Dundee, Scotland. I found all the ropes, sails and clothing that had been 

 abandoned in most excellent shape. The sails were like new. 



"On another sledging trip I ran across the headquarters of Sir George 

 Nares and Markham, who made an expedition in 1875 and 1876. I found 

 crockery, coal bags, wood and cartridges, some of which were loaded. 



"A peculiar thing about my discovery here was that I ran across a hand 

 push cart that this expedition used to carry their supplies from the ship to 

 the camp. The tracks of the cart still remained in the sand as sharply de- 

 fined as when they were first made. I took photographs of these tracks and 

 have the plates now. 



"The strangest part of all this Arctic work is the way the health of the men 

 is benefited. Instead of going into a regular course of athletic training, there 

 is a system of preparing a man for the dash by hunting in the moonlight and 

 sledging. It is only a question of time when the men become so hardened and 

 acclimated that they are in perfect physical condition for the work." 



