APPENDIX. 893 



Mare Island, California, and such other additions and improvements 

 were made as were recommended by her commanding officer ; and the 

 condition of the Jeannette on her departure from the port of San Fran- 

 cisco was good, and satisfactory to her officers and crew, except that 

 she was unavoidably deeply loaded, a defect which corrected itself by 

 the consumption of coal, provisions, and stores. 



Second. As to " her management up to the time of her loss." 



The lateness of the season when the Jeannette sailed from San Fran- 

 cisco, her want of speed, and the delay occasioned by her search along 

 the Siberian coast, under orders from the Navy Department, for the 

 Swedish exploring steamer Vega, placed the commander at a great 

 disadvantage on his meeting with the pack ice early in September, in 

 the vicinity of Herald Island. Either he had to return to some port to 

 the southward, and pass the winter there in idleness, thus sacrificing 

 all chance of pushing his researches to the northward until the follow- 

 ing summer, or else he must endeavor to force the vessel through to 

 Wrangel Island, then erroneously supposed to be a large continent, to 

 winter there, and prosecute his explorations by sledges. The chances 

 of accomplishing this latter alternative were sufficiently good at the 

 time to justify him in choosing it ; and, indeed, had he done otherwise, 

 he might fairly have been thought wanting in the high cpialities neces- 

 sary for an explorer. 



This attempt unfortunately resulted in the vessel's becoming beset in 

 the ice pack within less than two months after her departure from San 

 Francisco, from which she was never released until her destruction, 

 more than twenty-one months later. 



During these weary months of forced inaction the vessel and her 

 people were at times threatened with great dangers. Especially was 

 her destruction imminent on January 19, 1880. when she sprung aleak 

 from ice pressures, and for months after that date she was kept afloat 

 only by skillful devices and arduous labor. 



It may be here mentioned that throughout the expedition every op- 

 portunity was improved for gaining scientific information. Meteoro- 

 logical and astronomical observations, temperature and density of the 

 sea water, and soundings were taken and preserved ; studies of the 

 character and action of the ice were noted ; specimens of the bottom 

 and of such fauna and flora as could be procured were examined. 

 Three islands were discovered, two of which were visited, explored, 

 and taken possession of in the name of the United States. 



The arrangements to abandon ship at a moment's warning, and to 

 guard against fire, were all that could be desired, and the evidence 



