FARTHEST NORTH 



CHAPTER I 



INTRODUCTION 



" A time will come in later years when the Ocean will unloose the 

 bands of things, when the immeasurable earth will lie open, when sea- 

 farers will discover new countries, and Thule will no longer be the ex- 

 treme point among the lands." — Seneca. 



Unseen and untrodden under their spotless mantle of 

 ice the rigid polar regions slept the profound sleep of 

 death from the earliest dawn of time. Wrapped in his 

 white shroud, the mighty giant stretched his clammy 

 ice-limbs abroad, and dreamed his age-long dreams. 



Ages passed — deep was the silence. 



Then, in the dawn of history, far away in the south, 

 the awakening spirit of man reared its head on high 

 and gazed over the earth. To the south it encountered 

 warmth, to the north, cold ; and behind the boundaries 

 of the unknown it placed in imagination the twin king- 

 doms of consuming heat and of deadly cold. 



But the limits of the unknown had to recede step by 

 step before the ever-increasing yearning after light and 



