174 SCIENCE IN SHORT CHAPTERS. 



or thereabouts, while a fresh breeze like that enjoyed by 

 Captain Roher would, in the same time, carry him clear 

 across the whole of the circumpolar area to the neighbor- 

 hood of Spitzbergen, and two or three hours more of simi- 

 lar proceeding would land him in Siberia or Finland, or 

 even on the shores of Arctic Norway, where he could take 

 the Vadso or Hammerfest packet to meet one of Wilson's 

 liners at Trondhjem or Bergen, and thus get from the 

 North Pole to London in ten days. 



Lest any of my readers should think that I am writing 

 this at random, I will supply the particulars. I have be- 

 fore me the "Norges Communicationer" for the present 

 summer season of 1880. Twice every week a passenger 

 excursion steam packet sails round the North Cape each 

 way, calling at no less than twenty stations on this Arctic 

 face of Europe to land and embark passengers and goods. 

 By taking that which stops at Gjesvaer (an island near the 

 foot of the North Cape) on Saturday, or that which starts 

 from Hammerfest on Sunday morning, Trondhjem is 

 reached .on Thursday, and Wilson's liner, the "Tasso/' 

 starts on the same day for Hull, "average passage seventy 

 hours." Thus Hammerfest, the northernmost town in 

 the world, is now but eight days from London, including 

 a day's stop at Tromso, the capital of Lapland, which is 

 about 3 degrees N. of the Arctic circle, and within a week 

 of London. At Captain Roher's rate of traveling Tromso 

 would be but twenty-three hours from the Pole. 



These figures are, of course, only stated as possibilities 

 on the supposition that all the conditions should be favor- 

 able, but by no means as probable. 



What, then, are the probabilities and the amount of risk 

 that will attend an attempt to reach the Pole by an aerial 

 route ? 



I have considered the subject carefully, and discussed 

 it with many people ; the result of such reflection and 

 conversation is a conviction that the prevalent popular 

 estimate of the dangers of Commander Cheyne's project 

 extravagantly exaggerates them on almost all contingencies. 

 I do not affirm that there is no risk, or that the attempt 

 should be made with only our present practical knowledge 



