Spencer — Improbability of Land at the North Pole. 335 



I felt that disappointment was in store for them ; for Dr. 

 Hansen's great discovery of a profound Arctic basin, immedi- 

 ately beyond the border of the continental shelf, precluded 

 the probability of finding land between Franz Joseph Land and 

 the Pole, or indeed along this line for a thousand miles beyond, 

 until approaching the embouchure of the Mackenzie Piver, 

 although to the left of this line the continental shelf north of 

 Greenland, bearing perhaps an island, might extend far polar- 

 ward. Nansen had found the Polar basin to reach a depth of 

 12,000 feet or more. This would have to be crossed by any 

 expedition from the European side and here no portable sound- 

 ing apparatus could be effective until approaching the Ameri- 

 can shelf beyond the deep basin itself. But had the undertak- 

 ing been made from Grant Land, soundings to a depth of 

 3000 feet or less would have surely revealed the rapidly 

 increasing depth of the slope from the continental shelf to the 

 abyss of the basin, out of which no land could be expected to 

 rise. Thus the character of the Polar district would have been 

 discovered, perhaps without reaching to within some hundreds 

 of miles of the Pole, depending upon whether the shelf 

 extends far north of the known land or not. If the Ziegler 

 expedition were for the purpose of adding to our knowledge, 

 it is to me astounding that the route chosen should have 

 been approved of by the advisers, knowing of the deep sea 

 north of Europe, even without such analysis of the subject as 

 has since been published by Nansen, or is here set forth. If 

 the voyage were only one of adventure to reach an icy Pole 

 without any ostensible scientific object, then I give no opinion 

 as to the route taken. These remarks directed to an actual 

 expedition would equally apply to the proposed one of the 

 Duke of Orleans. They are written in the hope that future 

 Polar explorers will take cognizance of the scientific subma- 

 rine topography, avoiding useless expeditions and devoting 

 their efforts to extending scientific knowledge. 



To define the features around the Arctic basin, I should 

 draw an axis from Cape Bathurst, passing close to Bank's Land, 

 Prince Patrick's Land, the Pole, and on to Franz Joseph Land 

 and JSTovaya Zemlia, thus dividing it into two unequal lobes. 

 The one on the Siberian side is bounded by low lands, with 

 few islands, all of inconsiderable height in front. The confines 

 of the other lobe have bold features in the mountainous islands 

 of Novaya Zemlia, Franz Joseph Land, Spitzbergen, North 

 Greenland, Grinnell Land, Sverdrup's New Land to Prince 

 Patrick's Land and Bank's Land, which have less abrupt 

 features. 



In front of the Siberian plains and north of Bering Straits, 

 Dr. Nansen has shown from his own and other soundings that 



