608 THE WORLD'S WONDERS. 



banished by overpowering hunger, like mirages of crystal waters 

 rise before the vision of those suffering from thirst? 



Is it really a matter for wonder that the Greely party, cast 

 away and lost among the ice-crags and pitiless snows of a per- 

 petual wilderness ; freezing, starving, 'lying, with minds distorted 

 by acute suffering, where all nature howled a requiem of despair, 

 and desolation swept round their tattered tents like a ghoul 

 hunting for victims ; is it wonderful that, under such desperate 

 circumstances, the surviving members of the Greely party should 

 relieve their famine on the pulseless bodies of those lying under 

 the snow? Self-preservation being, in truth, the first law of 

 nature, every one must answer, "No." 



The sense of shame civilization's most enduring mark did 

 not abandon these brave men even in the last hour of their 

 dreadful trial, for as hunger drove them to break their fast upon 

 their dead comrades, they waited until the still watches of night 

 and crept in half-bent attitudes to where the bodies lay ; then, 

 scraping back nature's winding sheet, they began the butchery. 

 From arms, legs and bodies the pale flesh was stripped with keen 

 blades and devour only as starving men can devour ; but that, 

 for grace, God was asked to look down with pity and forgive- 

 ness, we cannot doubt. Let us draw a veil of charity over this 

 sad and wretched scene. 



CHAPTEK XXXIII. 



EFFORTS TO RELIEVE THE EXPLORERS. 



DURING all the years that Greely was carrying out instructions 

 and battling for honor and life, he was not forgotten by our 

 Government or people. In 1882 a relief expedition was fitted 

 out, according to promise, and dispatched for Littleton Island in 

 the steamer Neptune. The relief party left St. John's with a 

 large quantity of supplies July 8th, but on the 29th following 

 fp,und an imjitessabte barrier of ice extending from Cape Sabine 



