THE NORWEGIAN POLAR EXPEDITION. 



4^3 



While experienced whalers strongly advocated the square rig, Archer 

 decided to ignore their advice and rigged the Eram as a fore-and-aft 

 three-masted schooner, which style of rig proved, under the circum- 

 stances, to be most suitable. The slight increase in leakage is believed 

 by Archer to be due in part to the drawing of the oakum out of the 

 seams and in part to the expansion and contraction of the timbers. 

 While the Eram was not subjected to such tremendous ice convulsion s 

 as have been many other Arctic ships, yet her experiences were very 

 severe and may be considered to prove that the design and system of 

 construction adopted were the most efficient possible. 



The most extensive, if not the most important, of the treatises that 

 form this volume, relate to regions and investigations with which the 

 voyage of the Eram were only incidentally connected. Reference is had 

 to the papers on the geological formations of Cape Flora, Franz Josef 

 Land, by Professors Nansen, Pompeckj and Nathorst. Dr. Nansen most 

 cordially acknowledges his great indebtedness to Mr. Jackson and Dr. 

 Reginald Koettlitz, respectively the leader and geologist of the Jack- 

 son-Harmsworth expedition to Franz Josef Land, 1894-1896. The latter 

 of these gentlemen, in a spirit of broad scientific generosity, accorded 



