NATURE 



6i 



THURSDAY, MAY 27, 187S 



THE ARCTIC EXPEDITION 



ACCORDING to present arrangements, the Arctic 

 Expedition leaves our shores on Saturday next. 

 We feel that this event is one of no ordinary scientific 

 importance, and indeed that it is significant, in a high 

 degree, of a change which has come over the ideas of the 

 governors and the governed alike in this country. 



While prior Expeditions have advanced knowledge on 

 their way to a high northern latitude, the present one 

 sails to a high northern latitude for the purpose of 

 advancing knowledge. We believe that the Admiralty 

 authorities are fully aware of the importance of this dis- 

 tinction, and that when the final Instructions about to be 

 issued to Capt. Nares are published, it will be seen that 

 although they have been compelled to lay down a route 

 and to state a goal to be reached if possible, the advance- 

 ment of natural knowledge as opposed to mere topography 

 is recognised as the main object. ♦ 



All the best hearts in Britain will beat higher at the 

 thought of this noble British attempt to drive still 

 further back the boundaries of the unknown and the 

 unexplored in spite of the obvious perils with which the 

 attempt is surrounded. The work is undoubtedly one of 

 difficulty, and although a combination of past experience 

 and present discipline may be regarded as certain to 

 restore to us at some future day the gallant men now 

 aboard the Alert and Discovery, it is almost too much to 

 hope that both the ships will run the gauntlet of the ice- 

 barriers both out and home. Capt. Nares, we presume, 

 has, as the Admiralty Arctic Committee recommended, full 

 authority to abandon the Alert in 1877 if the exploration 

 in 1876 has been final or her escape be doubtful, and the 

 possible abandonment of both ships is contemplated in 

 the Committee's Report : this shows that the Admiralty 

 has counted the cost, and the fact that the Expedition 

 sails shows us how the benefit resulting from scientific 

 inquiry is acknowledged by the Government. 



Were the officers of the ships less devoted to the scien- 

 tific side of their work, or less capable of undertaking it 

 than they are, they might be fairly alarmed at the parting 

 gifts of the men of science which they have received 

 this week in the shape of Instruments of all kinds, a 

 special Arctic Manual of Scientific Inquiry of some 

 eight hundred pages, and Scientific Instructions in the 

 branches of work to which the Council of the Royal 

 Society attaches the highest importance. The Manual, 

 which has been edited by Prof. Rupert Jones on the biolo- 

 gical, and by Prof. W. G. Adams on the physical, side, is 

 supposed to contain the most important information 

 already acquired on the various inquiries to be prose- 

 cuted ; the Instructions being intended to show in what 

 direction and in what manner this information can be 

 extended. 



A glance at the Manual and Instructions, to which we 

 shall take occasion to refer more at length on a subse- 

 quent occasion, will make many regret that they are not 

 among those who, if they are incurring risk and under- 

 going privations, will, during the greater part of their 

 absence, be living in a new world of surpassing interest 

 from a scientific point of view, as well as of soul-stirring 

 Vol. xii.— No. 291 



grandeur, not unmixed with awful beauty ; a world in 

 which there is almost a new astronomy, where even the 

 colours of the sky are different, and where not only the 

 physicist but the biologist finds fresh wonders at every step. 



The Hydrographer of the Admiralty, Capt. Evans, 

 has made a noble contribution to the volume of In- 

 structions, in the shape of three provisional maps 

 of the Magnetic Elements, not only over the whole 

 of the region to be explored, but including Greenland 

 and part of the region to the west of Baffin's Bay and 

 Davis' Strait. The various inquiries to be prosecuted 

 by the officers and the naturalists of the Expedition, 

 Capt. Feilden and Mr. Hart, are dealt with in the In- 

 structions, among others, by Profs. Stokes, Sir Wm. 

 Thomson, Adams, and Tyndall, the Hydrographer, Mr. 

 Hind, Mr. Spottiswoode, Dr. Haughton, Mr. Scott, Dr. 

 Rae, and Mr. Lockyer, on the physical side ; and by Dr. 

 Hooker, Profs. Huxley, AUman, Flower, Maskelyne, 

 Ramsay, and Roscoe, Dr. Giinther, Mr. Gwyn Jeffreys, 

 Mr. J. Evans, and Mr. Judd on the biological, geological, 

 and mineralogical sides. 



Looking at the contents of the Manual, every possible 

 source of information in Arctic Biology, Geology, and 

 Physics would seem to have been ransacked, and the 

 result is a volume which must be of the highest value, 

 not only to those whose only text-book it will be for the 

 next two or three .years, but to all who wish for the best 

 information about the region for which the envied ex- 

 plorers sail on Saturday. Among those whose contri- 

 butions have been printed in the biological department will 

 be found such names as those of Liitken, Morch, Gieseckd, 

 Hooker, Heer, Nordenskjold, Huxley, E. Forbes, and 

 many others.. All the most notable Arctic explorers 

 have been drawn upon, from Sabine and Parry down to 

 Payer and Weyprecht ; while contributions will be found 

 from many of the greatest living authorities on such 

 subjects as Meteorology, Physical Properties of Ice, 

 Tides and Currents, Geodesy and Pendulum Experi- 

 ments. Terrestrial Magnetism, and the Aurora. 



It will be sufficiently evident, therefore, that those men 

 of science who were anxious for Arctic exploration, and 

 on whose recommendation the Government have fitted 

 out the Expedition, have done all in their power to make 

 it as complete as possible. The sending of the Valorous 

 to Disco with the Alert and Discovery will not only 

 enable it to start under the best conditions, but will 

 enable a new lustre to be added to the whole attempt, in 

 the shape of biological and temperature observations in 

 the waters passed through on the return journey, waters 

 which up to now have never been explored. For this we 

 have to thank Mr. Gwyn Jeffreys, for unless he had volun- 

 teered to superintend these researches, they certainly 

 would never have been made. It is to be hoped that the 

 authorities have not been unmindful of the importance of 

 at least duplicating all observations as soon as they are 

 made and of depositing them in safe places, so that 

 whatever may be the fate of the ships, the loss to science 

 shall be reduced to a minimum. 



Capt. Nares and those who accompany him may be 

 assured that though they will be lost to sight for a long 

 time to come, they will be by no means forgotten, all will 

 wish them success, and every hint of news will be eagerly 

 welcomed. May the two trews return " all told." 



