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The National Geographic Magazine 



To make some short land expeditions ; 



To secure what shooting we could ; 



If ice conditions permitted, to advance 

 north toward King William Land. 



During the winter of 1905 I entered 

 into correspondence with Mr Magnus K. 

 Giaever, of Tromso, Norway, and suc- 

 ceeded in chartering the auxiliary barken- 

 tine Laura. Mr Giaever is a ship-owner 

 of much experience in the Arctic waters. 

 Among other cruises, he accompanied 

 Mr Champ in the latter's Baldwin-Ziegler 

 Relief Expedition in 1905. Mr Giaever 

 is also owner of the ship Frithjof, which 

 was chartered by Mr Wellman for his 

 Arctic work last summer and rechartered 

 by him for his expedition this summer. 

 In addition to fully sustaining his repu- 

 tation as an Arctic outfitter, which had 

 preceded my acquaintance with him, Mr 

 Giaever proved a most agreeable compan- 

 ion and delightful gentleman. The Laura 

 was well fitted and equipped for Arctic 

 work, having good accommodations for 

 dark-room, taxidermy, etc. In accommo- 

 dations the Laura had six very com- 

 fortable deck cabins, 5^ by 6, and a com- 

 bination deck dining-room and saloon. 

 She carried from one hundred to one 

 hundred and fifty tons of coal without a 

 deck-load, on an average consumption of 

 two ton per day in the ice, although rely- 

 ing principally on sail in the open sea. 



The members of my party were as fol- 

 lows : N. C. Livingstone Learmonth, 

 Hanford, Blandford, England ; Dr C. R. 

 Holmes, ship surgeon ; Mrs Holmes, his- 

 torian ; Karl Holmes, and Mrs Eleisch- 

 man. All of my guests save Mr Lear- 

 month are Cincinnatians. 



Dr Llolmes and m^^self have been criti- 

 cised for allowing the ladies to accom- 

 pany us, but neither of us have had cause 

 to regret having taken them along, as 

 they stood the cruise surprisingly well, 

 and Mrs Holmes and Mrs Fleischman 

 cheerfully bear testimony that they gath- 

 ered a great deal of pleasure and, if any- 

 thing, received benefit from their entirely 

 novel, if unusual, experiences. 



I have also been asked if time did not 

 hang heavily upon our hands, and how 



we managed to amuse ourselves in order 

 to kill what some of our inquirers termed 

 "the dullness of it." In answer to these 

 inquiries it has been my pleasure to re- 

 ply, that so far as the writer is concerned, 

 there was not one dull moment during the 

 whole trip, and in this statement I have 

 enjoyed the hearty second of all who ac- 

 companied me. As soon as one is well 

 in the ice, there is always the interesting 

 anticipation of what is going to happen 

 next. During a heavy Arctic fog, which 

 sometimes lasts two or three days at a 

 time and which necessitates tying up to 

 an ice floe, one does not get dull. An 

 overly anxious Arctic traveler may, per- 

 haps, fret or chafe a bit because of these 

 tmavoidable delays at not being able to 

 make progress toward his destination, but 

 he or she of philosophic mind will sit 

 down and play a few rubbers of bridge 

 or listen to the musical grind of the 

 phonograph. Far be it from me to say 

 that any of my party were philosophers, 

 nor were they the sons or daughters of 

 philosophers, but we found that we could 

 endure the fretting and still fight off 

 ennui quite successfully because of our 

 more or less expert knowledge of cards 

 and our love for music. A phonograph 

 on a trip of this kind is certainly a great 

 source of pleasure and enables a befogged 

 or ice-bound party to pass hours that 

 might possiblv otherwise be set down as 

 "dull." 



We went aboard the Laura-a.t midnight 

 on June 16, raised anchor, and proceeded 

 north at 3 :30 a. m. on June 1 7. Upon 

 arriving at Skaaro a heavy gale made it 

 unwise to put to sea, and we staid at. 

 anchor at that port until the 19th, before 

 again putting out, our course being to- 

 ward Spitzbergen. Passing Bear Island, 

 we encountered heavy masses of drift ice. 



As the experience of former expedi- 

 tions had shown it to be inadvisable to 

 attempt making the Greenland coast be- 

 fore July, it was decided to spend the 

 intervening time in a shooting trip after 

 reindeer. While the metaphor is badly 

 applied, I might say that in our loafing 

 we "killed two birds with one stone," 



