DISCOVERY 



129 



is that these early expeditions achieved so much, 

 burdened and hampered as they were in their move- 

 ments. Their achievements speak volumes for skill 

 in seamanship and high endeavour and great endurance 

 in travelhng. Dr. John Rae, the discoverer of the fate 

 of Franklin and his men, had great success as an 

 Arctic sledger, because he utilised dogs for traction, 

 and depended largely on the game the country pro- 

 vided. Thus he was enabled to travel light with small 

 parties, and succeeded in covering great distances 

 at high speed with a minimum of exertion. Large 

 parties are at a disadvantage whether the provisions 

 are carried or obtained by hunting on the way. Nansen, 

 in his fine journey from the Fram to Franz Josef Land 

 in 1895, travelled with one companion, and during their 

 wintering the two lived on little else than the produce 

 of the sea. 



Peary was a believer in small parties, but his practice 

 of carrying with him practically all his provisions 

 necessitated a system of supporting parties. His 

 dash to the Pole in 1909 was at an almost incredible 

 speed : sufficiency of food and lightness of load could 

 be combined only through speed. Sverdrup, Isachsen, 

 and other Norwegians did notable work by small 

 parties with dog sledges. It was left for Rasmussen 

 and other Danes in Greenland, and particularly 

 Stefansson in Canadian Arctic islands, to perfect the 

 method of " U\ang by forage " and travelling light in 

 small parties. So successful has Stefansson been by 

 these means that he has been able to stay long periods 

 cut off from a base without suffering any inconvenience. 

 Even tea, coffee, and tobacco are dispensed with. 

 On one occasion Stefansson left the shores of Alaska 

 to cross the south-east of the Beaufort Sea, a journey 

 which took him 96 days, with two weeks' provision^, 

 but suffered from no lack of food. To him the seal 

 is a source of food and fuel, and he has shown that their 

 numbers have no direct relation to latitude. They 

 arc frequent in most parts of Arctic seas, even 

 if " ice deserts," places devoid of seals, occur, and 

 necessitate a dash to escape starvation unless some 

 reserve meat is carried. Not only does this method 

 of living immensely lighten the explorer's task, but also 

 it prevents all risk of scurvy, and Stefansson has shown 

 that an exclusive meat and blubber diet, even without 

 salt, is in no way harmful to health or destructive of 

 powers of endurance. 



While Arctic sea-ice on the whole lends itself to 

 sledge travelling, because of the land-locked nature 

 of the polar basin, there are great difficulties to 

 be faced which in places are almost insuperable, as 

 man}' an early explorer found to his cost. Open lanes 

 of water may always be encountered, especially near 

 the edges of the pack where the ocean is widest, but 

 are relatively unlikclv off the Parry Islands, EUesmere 



Land, Grant Land, and Greenland. Pressure ridges are 

 great obstacles near land, especially north of Greenland. 

 But most troublesome of all is the drift of the pack 

 which in some parts is so considerable that no journey 

 against the drift is likely to make headway. In 1827 

 Parry had to abandon his attempt to attain a high 

 northern latitude by sledging north from Spitsbergen, 

 because the southerly drift nullified all his efforts ; and 

 in 1900 Cagni, on his return from his northern record, 

 lat. 86° 33' N., had great difficulty in regaining his base 

 in Franz Josef Land owing to the drift carrying him 

 to the south-west. 



On the other hand, advantage can, of course, be 

 taken of the drift in planning a journey, now that its 

 general direction is known. It is in this way that the 

 most successful explorations of the Arctic Ocean have 

 been made, as in the case of the Fram. Amundsen in 

 the Maud should turn up near Greenland in two or 

 three years' time. 



Ice-breakers have some small value near the edge 

 of the pack, but experience has shown that they cannot 

 penetrate far, and are unable to make much impression 

 on ice of several years' growth. F'or several seasons 

 Russian ice-breakers explored the Siberian fringe of 

 the Arctic Ocean, but were unable to escape the neces- 

 sity of either wintering ice-bound or retreating in 

 autumn. 



For a di.scussion of V. Stefansson's methods o£ exploration, 

 see his articles in the Geographical Review (New York), especi- 

 ally October 1918, May 1919. and September 1920. Reference 

 should also be made to a recent article by F. Debenham : 

 " The Future of Polar Exploration." Geographical Journal, 

 March 1921. For trustworthy accounts of the history of polar 

 exploration the best books available are — (Arctic) Handbook of 

 Polar Discoveries' A. \V.^Gree]ey (Boston, 1907); (.\ntarctic) 

 The Siege 0/ the South Pole. H. R. Mill (London, 1905). Later 

 works do not equal these in completeness and accuracy. 



Plant Hygiene 



By George G. Gough, A.R.G.Sc., B.Sc. 



Blights and pests on plants are no new things, and 

 they are mentioned in the earliest books on agri- 

 culture and horticulture, but little or nothing was 

 known as to their cause ; in fact, they were looked 

 upon as a visitation of God. 



The term " blight " is still commonly used in a 

 general sense, although, nowadaj's, it is chiefly applied 

 either to attacks of " green fly " or to ordinary potato 

 disease. In the country it was by no means uncommon 

 for dull, misty days to be looked upon as caused by 

 Wight, and the natural corollary of this view was that 

 nothing could be done to save a crop when it was 



