telegraphic line; while, between 1872 and 1876, Ernest Giles performed
the same feat to the north. Quite recently, in 1897, these two
routes were joined by the journey of the Honourable Daniel Carnegie
from the Coolgardie gold fields in the south to those of Kimberley
in the north. These explorations, while adding to our knowledge
of the interior of Australia, have only confirmed the impression
that it was not worth knowing.

[_Authorities:_ Rev. G. Grimm, _Discovsry and Exploration of Australia_
(Melbourne, 1888); A. F. Calvert, _Discovery of Australia_, 1893;
_Exploration of Australia_, 1895; _Early Voyages to Australia_,
Hakluyt Society.]




CHAPTER XI

EXPLORATION AND PARTITION OF AFRICA: PARK--LIVINGSTONE--STANLEY

We have seen how the Portuguese had slowly coasted along the shore
of Africa during the fifteeenth century in search of a way to the
Indies. By the end of the century mariners _portulanos_ gave a
rude yet effective account of the littoral of Africa, both on the
west and the eastern side. Not alone did they explore the coast, but
they settled upon it. At Amina on the Guinea coast, at Loando near
the Congo, and at Benguela on the western coast, they established
stations whence to despatch the gold and ivory, and, above all, the
slaves, which turned out to be the chief African products of use
to Europeans. On the east coast they settled at Sofala, a port of
Mozambique; and in Zanzibar they possessed no less than three ports,
those first visited by Vasco da Gama and afterwards celebrated by
Milton in the sonorous line contained in the gorgeous geographical
excursus in the Eleventh Book--

"Mombaza and Quiloa and Melind."
--_Paradise Lost_, xi. 339.

It is probable that, besides settling on the coast, the Portuguese
from time to time made explorations into the interior. At any rate,
in some maps of the sixteenth and seventeenth century there is
shown a remarkable knowledge of the course of the Nile. We get
it terminated in three large lakes, which can be scarcely other
than the Victoria and Albert Nyanza, and Tanganyika. The Mountains
of the Moon also figure prominently, and it was only almost the
other day that Mr. Stanley re-discovered them. It is difficult,
however, to determine how far these entries on the Portuguese maps
were due to actual knowledge or report, or to the traditions of a
still earlier knowledge of these lakes and mountains; for in the
maps accompanying the early editions of Ptolemy we likewise obtain
the same information, which is repeated by the Arabic geographers,
obviously from Ptolemy, and not from actual observation. When the
two great French cartographers Delisle and D'Anville determined
not to insert anything on their maps for which they had not some
evidence, these lakes and mountains disappeared, and thus it has
come about that maps of the seventeenth century often appear to
display more knowledge of the interior of Africa than those of the
beginning of the nineteenth, at least with regard to the sources
of the Nile.

[Illustration: DAPPER'S MAP OF AFRICA, 1676.]

African exploration of the interior begins with the search for
the sources of the Nile, and has been mainly concluded by the
determination of the course of the three other great rivers, the
Niger, the Zambesi, and the Congo. It is remarkable that all four
rivers have had their course determined by persons of British
nationality. The names of Bruce and Grant will always be associated
with the Nile, that of Mungo Park with the Niger, Dr. Livingstone with
the Zambesi, and Mr. Stanley with the Congo. It is not inappropriate
that, except in the case of the Congo, England should control the
course of the rivers which her sons first made accessible to
civilisation.

We have seen that there was an ancient tradition reported by Herodotus,
that the Nile trended off to the west and became there the river
Niger; while still earlier there was an impression that part of
it at any rate wandered eastward, and some way joined on to the
same source as the Tigris and Euphrates--at least that seems to be
the suggestion in the biblical account of Paradise. Whatever the
reason, the greatest uncertainty existed as to the actual course
of the river, and to discover the source of the Nile was for many
centuries the standing expression for performing the impossible. In
1768, James Bruce, a Scottish gentleman of position, set out with
the determination of solving this mystery--a determination which
he had made in early youth, and carried out with characteristic
pertinacity. He had acquired a certain amount of knowledge of Arabic
and acquaintance with African customs as Consul at Algiers. He went
up the Nile as far as Farsunt, and then crossed the desert to the Red
Sea, went over to Jedda, from which he took ship for Massowah, and
began his search for the sources of the Nile in Abyssinia. He visited
the ruins of Axum, the former capital, and in the neighbourhood of
that place saw the incident with which his travels have always
been associated, in which a couple of rump-steaks were extracted
from a cow while alive, the wound sewn up, and the animal driven
on farther.

Here, guided by some Gallas, he worked his way up the Blue Nile
to the three fountains, which he declared to be the true sources
of the Nile, and identified with the three mysterious lakes in
the old maps. From there he worked his way down the Nile, reaching
Cairo in 1773. Of course what he had discovered was merely the
source of the Blue Nile, and even this had been previously visited
by a Portuguese traveller named Payz. But the interesting adventures
which he experienced, and the interesting style in which he told
them, aroused universal attention, which was perhaps increased
by the fact that his journey was undertaken purely from love of
adventure and discovery. The year 1768 is distinguished by the
two journeys of James Cook and James Bruce, both of them expressly
for purposes of geographical discovery, and thus inaugurating the
era of what may be called scientific exploration. Ten years later
an association was formed named the African Association, expressly
intended to explore the unknown parts of Africa, and the first
geographical society called into existence. In 1795 MUNGO PARK was
despatched by the Association to the west coast. He started from
the Gambia, and after many adventures, in which he was captured
by the Moors, arrived at the banks of the Niger, which he traced
along its middle course, but failed to reach as far as Timbuctoo.
He made a second attempt in 1805, hoping by sailing down the Niger
to prove its identity with the river known at its mouth as the
Congo; but he was forced to return, and died at Boussa, without
having determined the remaining course of the Niger.

Attention was thus drawn to the existence of the mysterious city
of Timbuctoo, of which Mungo Park had brought back curious rumours
on his return from his first journey. This was visited in 1811 by
a British seaman named Adams, who had been wrecked on the Moorish
coast, and taken as a slave by the Moors across to Timbuctoo. He
was ultimately ransomed by the British consul at Mogador, and his
account revived interest in West African exploration. Attempts were
made to penetrate the secret of the Niger, both from Senegambia
and from the Congo, but both were failures, and a fresh method was
adopted, possibly owing to Adams' experience in the attempt to
reach the Niger by the caravan routes across the Sahara. In 1822
Major Denham and Lieutenant Clapperton left Murzouk, the capital
of Fezzan, and made their way to Lake Chad and thence to Bornu.
Clapperton, later on, again visited the Niger from Benin. Altogether
these two travellers added some two thousand miles of route to
our knowledge of, West Africa. In 1826-27 Timbuctoo was at last
visited by two Europeans--Major Laing in the former year, who was
murdered there; and a young Frenchman, Réné Caillié, in the latter.
His account aroused great interest, and Tennyson began his poetic
career by a prize-poem on the subject of the mysterious African
capital.

It was not till 1850 that the work of Denham and Clapperton was
again taken up by Barth, who for five years explored the whole
country to the west of Lake Chad, visiting Timbuctoo, and connecting
the lines of route of Clapperton and Caillié. What he did for the
west of Lake Chad was accomplished by Nachtigall east of that lake
in Darfur and Wadai, in a journey which likewise took five years
(1869-74). Of recent years political interests have caused numerous
expeditions, especially by the French to connect their possessions
in Algeria and Tunis with those on the Gold Coast and on the Senegal.

The next stage in African exploration is connected with the name
of the man to whom can be traced practically the whole of recent
discoveries. By his tact in dealing with the natives, by his calm
pertinacity and dauntless courage, DAVID LIVINGSTONE succeeded
in opening up the entirely unknown districts of Central Africa.
Starting from the Cape in 1849, he worked his way northward to the
Zambesi, and then to Lake Dilolo, and after five years' wandering
reached the western coast of Africa at Loanda. Then retracing his
steps to the Zambesi again, he followed its course to its mouth
on the east coast, thus for the first time crossing Africa from
west to east. In a second journey, on which he started in 1858, he
commenced tracing the course of the river Shiré, the most important
affluent of the Zambesi, and in so doing arrived on the shores of
Lake Nyassa in September 1859.

Meanwhile two explorers, Captain (afterwards Sir Richard) Burton
and Captain Speke, had started from Zanzibar to discover a lake of
which rumours had for a long time been heard, and in the following
year succeeded in reaching Lake Tanganyika. On their return Speke
parted from Burton and took a route more to the north, from which
he saw another great lake, which afterwards turned out to be the
Victoria Nyanza. In 1860, with another companion (Captain Grant),
Speke returned to the Victoria Nyanza, and traced out its course. On
the north of it they found a great river trending to the north, which
they followed as far as Gondokoro. Here they found Mr. (afterwards Sir
Samuel) Baker, who had travelled up the White Nile to investigate its
source, which they thus proved to be in the Lake Victoria Nyanza.
Baker continued his search, and succeeded in showing that another
source of the Nile was to be found in a smaller lake to the west,
which he named Albert Nyanza. Thus these three Englishmen had combined
to solve the long-sought problem of the sources of the Nile.

The discoveries of the Englishmen were soon followed up by important
political action by the Khedive of Egypt, Ismail Pasha, who claimed
the whole course of the Nile as part of his dominions, and established
stations all along it. This, of course, led to full information about
the basin of the Nile being acquired for geographical purposes, and,
under Sir Samuel Baker and Colonel Gordon, civilisation was for a
time in possession of the Nile from its source to its mouth.

Meanwhile Livingstone had set himself to solve the problem of the
great Lake Tanganyika, and started on his last journey in 1865
for that purpose. He discovered Lakes Moero and Bangweolo, and
the river Nyangoue, also known as Lualaba. So much interest had
been aroused by Livingstone's previous exploits of discovery, that
when nothing had been heard of him for some time, in 1869 Mr. H.
M. Stanley was sent by the proprietors of the _New York Herald_,
for whom he had previously acted as war-correspondent, to find
Livingstone. He started in 1871 from Zanzibar, and before the end
of the year had come across a white man in the heart of the Dark
Continent, and greeted him with the historic query, "Dr. Livingstone,
I presume?" Two years later Livingstone died, a martyr to geographical
and missionary enthusiasm. His work was taken up by Mr. Stanley,
who in 1876 was again despatched to continue Livingstone's work,
and succeeded in crossing the Dark Continent from Zanzibar to the
mouth of the Congo, the whole course of which he traced, proving
that the Lualaba or Nyangoue were merely different names or affluents
of this mighty stream. Stanley's remarkable journey completed the
rough outline of African geography by defining the course of the
fourth great river of the continent.

But Stanley's journey across the Dark Continent was destined to be
the starting-point of an entirely new development of the African
problem. Even while Stanley was on his journey a conference had been
assembled at Brussels by King Leopold, in which an international
committee was formed representing all the nations of Europe, nominally
for the exploration of Africa, but, as it turned out, really for
its partition among the European powers. Within fifteen years of
the assembly of the conference the interior of Africa had been
parcelled out, mainly among the five powers, England, France, Germany,
Portugal, and Belgium. As in the case of America, geographical
discovery was soon followed by political division.

[Illustration: EXPLORATION AND PARTITION OF AFRICA.]

The process began by the carving out of a state covering the whole
of the newly-discovered Congo, nominally independent, but really
forming a colony of Belgium, King Leopold supplying the funds for
that purpose. Mr. Stanley was despatched in 1879 to establish stations
along the lower course of the river, but, to his surprise, he found
that he had been anticipated by M. de Brazza, a Portuguese in the
service of France, who had been despatched on a secret mission to
anticipate the King of the Belgians in seizing the important river
mouth. At the same time Portugal put in claims for possession of
the Congo mouth, and it became clear that international rivalries
would interfere with the foundation of any state on the Congo unless
some definite international arrangement was arrived at. Almost
about the same time, in 1880, Germany began to enter the field
as a colonising power in Africa. In South-West Africa and in the
Cameroons, and somewhat later in Zanzibar, claims were set up on
behalf of Germany by Prince Bismarck which conflicted with English
interests in those districts, and under his presidency a Congress
was held at Berlin in the winter of 1884-85 to determine the rules
of the claims by which Africa could be partitioned. The old historic
claims of Portugal to the coast of Africa, on which she had established
stations both on the west and eastern side, were swept away by the
principle that only effective occupation could furnish a claim of
sovereignty. This great principle will rule henceforth the whole
course of African history; in other words, the good old Border
rule--

"That they should take who have the power.
And they should keep who can."

Almost immediately after the sitting of the Berlin Congress, and
indeed during it, arrangements were come to by which the respective
claims of England and Germany in South-West Africa were definitely
determined. Almost immediately afterwards a similar process had to
be gone through in order to determine the limits of the respective
"spheres of influence," as they began to be called, of Germany and
England in East Africa. A Chartered Company, called the British East
Africa Association, was to administer the land north of Victoria Nyanza
bounded on the west by the Congo Free State, while to the north it
extended till it touched the revolted provinces of Egypt, of which
we shall soon speak. In South Africa a similar Chartered Company,
under the influence of Mr. Cecil Rhodes, practically controlled the
whole country from Cape Colony up to German East Africa and the
Congo Free State.

The winter of 1890-91 was especially productive of agreements of
demarcation. After a considerable amount of friction owing to the
encroachments of Major Serpa Pinto, the limits of Portuguese Angola
on the west coast were then determined, being bounded on the east
by the Congo Free State and British Central Africa; and at the
same time Portuguese East Africa was settled in its relation both
to British Central Africa on the west and German East Africa on
the north. Meanwhile Italy had put in its claims for a share in
the spoil, and the eastern horn of Africa, together with Abyssinia,
fell to its share, though it soon had to drop it, owing to the
unexpected vitality shown by the Abyssinians. In the same year
(1890) agreements between Germany and England settled the line of
demarcation between the Cameroons and Togoland, with the adjoining
British territories; while in August of the same year an attempt
was made to limit the abnormal pretensions of the French along
the Niger, and as far as Lake Chad. Here the British interests
were represented by another Chartered Company, the Royal Niger
Company. Unfortunately the delimitation was not very definite,
not being by river courses or meridians as in other cases, but
merely by territories ruled over by native chiefs, whose boundaries
were not then particularly distinct. This has led to considerable
friction, lasting even up to the present day; and it is only with
reference to the demarcation between England and France in Africa
that any doubt still remains with regard to the western and central
portions of the continent.

Towards the north-east the problem of delimitation had been complicated
by political events, which ultimately led to another great exploring
expedition by Mr. Stanley. The extension of Egypt into the Equatorial
Provinces under Ismail Pasha, due in large measure to the geographical
discoveries of Grant, Speke, and Baker, led to an enormous accumulation
of debt, which caused the country to become bankrupt, Ismail Pasha
to be deposed, and Egypt to be administered jointly by France and
England on behalf of the European bondholders. This caused much
dissatisfaction on the part of the Egyptian officials and army
officers, who were displaced by French and English officials; and
a rebellion broke out under Arabi Pasha. This led to the armed
intervention of England, France having refused to co-operate, and
Egypt was occupied by British troops. The Soudan and Equatorial
Provinces had independently revolted under Mohammedan fanaticism,
and it was determined to relinquish those Egyptian possessions,
which had originally led to bankruptcy. General Gordon was despatched
to relieve the various Egyptian garrisons in the south, but being
without support, ultimately failed, and was killed in 1885. One
of Gordon's lieutenants, a German named Schnitzler, who appears
to have adopted Mohammedanism, and was known as Emin Pasha, was
thus isolated in the midst of Africa near the Albert Nyanza, and
Mr. Stanley was commissioned to attempt his rescue in 1887. He
started to march through the Congo State, and succeeded in traversing
a huge tract of forest country inhabited by diminutive savages,
who probably represented the Pigmies of the ancients. He succeeded
in reaching Emin Pasha, and after much persuasion induced him to
accompany him to Zanzibar, only, however, to return as a German
agent to the Albert Nyanza. Mr. Stanley's journey on this occasion
was not without its political aspects, since he made arrangements
during the eastern part of his journey for securing British influence
for the lands afterwards handed over to the British East Africa
Company.

All these political delimitations were naturally accompanied by
explorations, partly scientific, but mainly political. Major Serpa
Pinto twice crossed Africa in an attempt to connect the Portuguese
settlements on the two coasts. Similarly, Lieutenant Wissmann also
crossed Africa twice, between 1881 and 1887, in the interests of
the Congo State, though he ultimately became an official of his
native country, Germany. Captain Lugard had investigated the region
between the three Lakes Nyanza, and secured it for Great Britain.
In South Africa British claims were successfully and successively
advanced to Bechuana-land, Mashona-land, and Matabele-land, and,
under the leadership of Mr. Cecil Rhodes, a railway and telegraph
were rapidly pushed forward towards the north. Owing to the enterprise
of Mr. (now Sir H. H.) Johnstone, the British possessions were in
1891 pushed up as far as Nyassa-land. By that date, as we have
seen, various treaties with Germany and Portugal had definitely
fixed the contour lines of the different possessions of the three
countries in South Africa. By 1891 the interior of Africa, which
had up to 1880 been practically a blank, could be mapped out almost
with as much accuracy as, at any rate, South America. Europe had
taken possession of Africa.

One of the chief results of this, and formally one of its main
motives, was the abolition of the slave trade. North Africa has
been Mohammedan since the eighth century, and Islam has always
recognised slavery, consequently the Arabs of the north have continued
to make raids upon the negroes of Central Africa, to supply the
Mohammedan countries of West Asia and North Africa with slaves.
The Mahdist rebellion was in part at least a reaction against the
abolition of slavery by Egypt, and the interest of the next few
years will consist in the last stand of the slave merchants in
the Soudan, in Darfur, and in Wadai, east of Lake Chad, where the
only powerful independent Mohammedan Sultanate still exists. England
is closely pressing upon the revolted provinces, along the upper
course of the Nile; while France is attempting, by expeditions
from the French Congo and through Abyssinia, to take possession
of the Upper Nile before England conquers it. The race for the
Upper Nile is at present one of the sources of danger of European
war.

While exploration and conquest have either gone hand in hand, or
succeeded one another very closely, there has been a third motive
that has often led to interesting discoveries, to be followed by
annexation. The mighty hunters of Africa have often brought back,
not alone ivory and skins, but also interesting information of
the interior. The gorgeous narratives of Gordon Cumming in the
"fifties" were one of the causes which led to an interest in African
exploration. Many a lad has had his imagination fired and his career
determined by the exploits of Gordon Cumming, which are now, however,
almost forgotten. Mr. F. C. Selous has in our time surpassed even
Gordon Cumming's exploits, and has besides done excellent work
as guide for the successive expeditions into South Africa.

Thus, practically within our own time, the interior of Africa, where
once geographers, as the poet Butler puts it, "placed elephants instead
of towns," has become known, in its main outlines, by successive
series of intrepid explorers, who have often had to be warriors as
well as scientific men. Whatever the motives that have led the
white man into the centre of the Dark Continent--love of adventure,
scientific curiosity, big game, or patriotism--the result has been
that the continent has become known instead of merely its coast-line.
On the whole, English exploration has been the main means by which
our knowledge of the interior of Africa has been obtained, and
England has been richly rewarded by coming into possession of the
most promising parts of the continent--the Nile valley and temperate
South Africa. But France has also gained a huge extent of country
covering almost the whole of North-West Africa. While much of this
is merely desert, there are caravan routes which tap the basin of
the Niger and conduct its products to Algeria, conquered by France
early in the century, and to Tunis, more recently appropriated. The
West African provinces of France have, at any rate, this advantage,
that they are nearer to the mother-country than any other colony
of a European power; and the result may be that African soldiers
may one of these days fight for France on European soil, just as
the Indian soldiers were imported to Cyprus by Lord Beaconsfield
in 1876. Meanwhile, the result of all this international ambition
has been that Africa in its entirety is now known and accessible
to European civilisation.

[_Authorities:_ Kiepert, _Beiträge zur Entdeckungsgeschichte Afrikas_,
1873; Brown, _The Story of Africa_, 4 vols., 1894; Scott Keltie,
_The Partition of Africa_, 1896.]




CHAPTER XII

THE POLES--FRANKLIN--ROSS--NORDENSKIOLD--NANSEN

Almost the whole of the explorations which we have hitherto described
or referred to had for their motive some practical purpose, whether
to reach the Spice Islands or to hunt big game. Even the excursions
of Davis, Frobisher, Hudson, and Baffin in pursuit of the north-west
passage, and of Barentz and Chancellor in search of the north-east
passage, were really in pursuit of mercantile ends. It is only with
James Cook that the era of purely scientific exploration begins,
though it is fair to qualify this statement by observing that the
Russian expedition under Behring, already referred to, was ordered
by Peter the Great to determine a strictly geographical problem,
though doubtless it had its bearings on Russian ambitions. Behring
and Cook between them, as we have seen, settled the problem of the
relations existing between the ends of the two continents Asia
and America, but what remained still to the north of _terra firma_
within the Arctic Circle? That was the problem which the nineteenth
century set itself to solve, and has very nearly succeeded in the
solution. For the Arctic Circle we now possess maps that only show
blanks over a few thousand square miles.

This knowledge has been gained by slow degrees, and by the exercise
of the most heroic courage and endurance. It is a heroic tate, in
which love of adventure and zeal for science have combated with
and conquered the horrors of an Arctic winter, the six months'
darkness in silence and desolation, the excessive cold, and the
dangers of starvation. It is impossible here to go into any of
the details which rendered the tale of Arctic voyages one of the
most stirring in human history. All we are concerned with here is
the amount of new knowledge brought back by successive expeditions
within the Arctic Circle.

This region of the earth's surface is distinguished by a number
of large islands in the eastern hemisphere, most of which were
discovered at an early date. We have seen how the Norsemen landed
and settled upon Greenland as early as the tenth century. Burrough
sighted Nova Zembla in 1556; in one of the voyages in search of the
north-east passage, though the very name (Russian for Newfoundland)
implies that it had previously been sighted and named by Russian
seamen. Barentz is credited with having sighted Spitzbergen. The
numerous islands to the north of Siberia became known through the
Russian investigations of Discheneff, Behring, and their followers;
while the intricate network of islands to the north of the continent
of North America had been slowly worked out during the search for the
north-west passage. It was indeed in pursuit of this will-of-the-wisp
that most of the discoveries in the Arctic Circle were made, and
a general impetus given to Arctic exploration.

It is with a renewed attempt after this search that the modern history
of Arctic exploration begins. In 1818 two expeditions were sent under
the influence of Sir Joseph Banks to search the north-west passage,
and to attempt to reach the Pole. The former was the objective of
John Ross in the _Isabella_ and W. E. Parry in the _Alexander_,
while in the Polar exploration John Franklin sailed in the _Trent_.
Both expeditions were unsuccessful, though Ross and Parry confirmed
Baffin's discoveries. Notwithstanding this, two expeditions were
sent two years later to attempt the north-west passage, one by land
under Franklin, and the other by sea under Parry. Parry managed
to get half-way across the top of North America, discovered the
archipelago named after him, and reached 114° West longitude, thereby
gaining the prize of £5000 given by the British Parliament for
the first seaman that sailed west of the 110th meridian. He was
brought up, however, by Banks Land, while the strait which, if he
had known it, would have enabled him to complete the north-west
passage, was at that time closed by ice. In two successive voyages,
in 1822 and 1824, Parry increased the detailed knowledge of the
coasts he had already discovered, but failed to reach even as far
westward as he had done on his first voyage. This somewhat discouraged
Government attempts at exploration, and the next expedition, in
1829, was fitted out by Mr. Felix Booth, sheriff of London, who
despatched the paddle steamer _Victory_, commanded by John Ross.
He discovered the land known as Boothia Felix, and his nephew,
James C. Ross, proved that it belonged to the mainland of America,
which he coasted along by land to Cape Franklin, besides determining
the exact position of the North Magnetic Pole at Cape Adelaide, on
Boothia Felix. After passing five years within the Arctic Circle,
Ross and his companions, who had been compelled to abandon the
_Victory_, fell in with a whaler, which brought them home.

We must now revert to Franklin, who, as we have seen, had been
despatched by the Admiralty to outline the north coast of America,
only two points of which had been determined, the embouchures of
the Coppermine and the Mackenzie, discovered respectively by Hearne
and Mackenzie. It was not till 1821 that Franklin was able to start
out from the mouth of the Coppermine eastward in two canoes, by
which he coasted along till he came to the point named by him Point
Turn-again. By that time only three days' stores of pemmican remained,
and it was only with the greatest difficulty, and by subsisting
on lichens and scraps of roasted leather, that they managed to
return to their base of operations at Fort Enterprise. Four years
later, in 1825, Franklin set out on another exploring expedition
with the same object, starting this time from the mouth of the
Mackenzie river, and despatching one of his companions, Richardson,
to connect the coast between the Mackenzie and the Coppermine; while
he himself proceeded westward to meet the Blossom, which, under
Captain Beechey, had been despatched to Behring Strait to bring his
party back. Richardson was entirely successful in examining the
coast-line between the Mackenzie and the Coppermine; but Beechey,
though he succeeded in rounding Icy Cape and tracing the coast as
far as Point Barrow, did not come up to Franklin, who had only
got within 160 miles at Return Reef. These 160 miles, as well as
the 222 miles intervening between Cape Turn-again, Franklin's
easternmost point by land, and Cape Franklin, J. C. Ross's most
westerly point, were afterwards filled in by T. Simpson in 1837,
after a coasting voyage in boats of 1408 miles, which stands as a
record even to this day. Meanwhile the Great Fish River had been
discovered and followed to its mouth by C. J. Back in 1833. During
the voyage down the river, an oar broke while the boat was shooting
a rapid, and one of the party commenced praying in a loud voice;
whereupon the leader called out: "Is this a time for praying? Pull
your starboard oar!"

Meanwhile, interest had been excited rather more towards the South
Pole, and the land of which Cook had found traces in his search
for the fabled Australian continent surrounding it. He had reached
as far south as 71.10°, when he was brought up by the great ice
barrier. In 1820-23 Weddell visited the South Shetlands, south of
Cape Horn, and found an active volcano, even amidst the extreme
cold of that district. He reached as far south as 74°, but failed
to come across land in that district. In 1839 Bellany discovered
the islands named after him, with a volcano twelve thousand feet
high, and another still active on Buckle Island. In 1839 a French
expedition under Dumont d'Urville again visited and explored the
South Shetlands; while, in the following year, Captain Wilkes, of
the United States navy, discovered the land named after him. But
the most remarkable discovery made in Antarctica was that of Sir
J. C. Ross, who had been sent by the Admiralty in 1840 to identify
the South Magnetic Pole, as we have seen he had discovered that of
the north. With the two ships _Erebus_ and _Terror_ he discovered
Victoria Land and the two active volcanoes named after his ships,
and pouring forth flaming lava, amidst the snow. In January 1842
he reached farthest south, 76°. Since his time little has been
attempted in the south, though in the winter of 1894-95 C. E.
Borchgrevink again visited Victoria Land.

[Illustration: NORTH POLAR REGION--WESTERN HALF.]

On the return of the _Erebus_ and _Terror_ from the South Seas the
government placed these two vessels at the disposal of Franklin
(who had been knighted for his previous discoveries), and on the
26th of May 1845 he started with one hundred and twenty-nine souls
on board the two vessels, which were provisioned up to July 1848.
They were last seen by a whaler on the 26th July of the former
year waiting to pass into Lancaster Sound. After penetrating as
far north as 77°, through Wellington Channel, Franklin was obliged
to winter upon Beechey Island, and in the following year (September
1846) his two ships were beset in Victoria Strait, about twelve
miles from King William Land. Curiously enough, in the following
year (1847) J. Rae had been despatched by land from Cape Repulse
in Hudson's Bay, and had coasted along the east coast of Boothia,
thus connecting Ross's and Franklin's coast journeys with Hudson's
Bay. On 18th April 1847 Rae had reached a point on Boothia less
than 150 miles from Franklin on the other side of it. Less than
two months later, on the 11th June, Franklin died on the _Erebus_.
His ships were only provisioned to July 1848, and remained still
beset throughout the whole of 1847. Crozier, upon whom the command
devolved, left the ship with one hundred and five survivors to
try and reach Back's Fish River. They struggled along the west
coast of King William Land, but failed to reach their destination;
disease, and even starvation, gradually lessened their numbers.
An old Eskimo woman, who had watched the melancholy procession,
afterwards told M'Clintock they fell down and died as they walked.

By this time considerable anxiety had been roused by the absence of
any news from Franklin's party. Richardson and Rae were despatched
by land in 1848, while two ships were sent on the attempt to reach
Franklin through Behring Strait, and two others, the _Investigator_
and the _Enterprise_, under J. C. Ross, through Baffin Bay. Rae
reached the east coast of Victoria Land, and arrived within fifty
miles of the spot where Franklin's two ships had been abandoned;
but it was not till his second expedition by land, which started
in 1853, that he obtained any news. After wintering at Lady Pelly
Bay, on the 20th April 1854 Rae met a young Eskimo, who told him
that four years previously forty white men had been seen dragging
a boat to the south on the west shore of King William Land, and a
few months later the bodies of thirty of these men had been found
by the Eskimo, who produced silver with the Franklin crest to confirm
the truth of their statement. Further searches by land were continued
up to as late as 1879, when Lieutenant F. Schwatka, of the United
States army, discovered several of the graves and skeletons of
the Franklin expedition.

Neither of the two attempts by sea from the Atlantic or from the
Pacific base, in 1848, having succeeded in gaining any news, the
_Enterprise_ and the _Investigator_, which had previously attempted
to reach Franklin from the east, were despatched in 1850, under
Captain R. Collinson and Captain M'Clure; to attempt the search from
the west through Behring Strait. M'Clure, in the _Investigator_,
did not wait for Collinson, as he had been directed, but pushed on
and discovered Banks Land, and became beset in the ice in Prince of
Wales Strait. In the winter of 1850-51 he endeavoured unsuccessfully
to work his way from this strait into Parry Sound, but in August
and September 1851 managed to coast round Banks Land to its most
north-westerly point, and then succeeded in passing through the
strait named after M'Clure, and reached Barrow Strait, thus performing
for the first time the north-west passage, though it was not till
1853 that the _Investigator_ was abandoned. Collinson, in the
_Enterprise_, followed M'Clure closely, though never reaching him,
and attempting to round Prince Albert Land by the south through
Dolphin Strait, reached Cambridge Bay at the nearest point by ship
of all the Franklin expeditions. He had to return westward, and
only reached England in 1855, after an absence of five years and
four months.

From the east no less than ten vessels had attempted the Franklin
sea search in 1851, comprising two Admiralty expeditions, one private
English one, an American combined government and private party,
together with a ship put in commission by the wifely devotion of
Lady Franklin. These all attempted the search of Lancaster Sound,
where Franklin had last been seen, and they only succeeded in finding
three graves of men who had died at an early stage, and had been
buried on Beechey Island. Another set of four vessels were despatched
under Sir Edward Belcher in 1852, who were fortunate enough to
reach M'Clure in the _Investigator_ in the following year, and
enabled him to complete the north-west passage, for which he gained
the reward of £10,000 offered by Parliament in 1763. But Belcher was
obliged to abandon most of his vessels, one of which, the _Resolute_,
drifted over a thousand miles, and having been recovered by an
American whaler, was refitted by the United States and presented
to the queen and people of Great Britain.

Notwithstanding all these efforts, the Franklin remains have not
yet been discovered, though Dr. Rae, as we have seen, had practically
ascertained their terrible fate. Lady Franklin, however, was not
satisfied with this vague information. She was determined to fit
out still another expedition, though already over £35,000 had been
spent by private means, mostly from her own personal fortune; and
in 1857 the steam yacht _Fox_ was despatched under M'Clintock,
who had already shown himself the most capable master of sledge
work. He erected a monument to the Franklin expedition on Beechey
Island in 1858, and then following Peel Sound, he made inquiries
of the natives throughout the winter of 1858-59. This led him to
search King William Land, where, on the 25th May, he came across
a bleached human skeleton lying on its face, showing that the man
had died as he walked. Meanwhile, Hobson, one of his companions,
discovered a record of the Franklin expedition, stating briefly its
history between 1845 and 1848; and with this definite information
of the fate of the Franklin expedition M'Clintock returned to England
in 1859, having succeeded in solving the problem of Franklin's fate,
while exploring over 800 miles of coast-line in the neighbourhood
of King William Land.

The result of the various Franklin expeditions had thus been to
map out the intricate network of islands dotted over the north of
North America. None of these, however, reached much farther north
than 75°.

Only Smith Sound promised to lead north of the 80th parallel. This
had been discovered as early as 1616 by Baffin, whose farthest
north was only exceeded by forty miles, in 1852, by Inglefield in
the _Isabel_, one of the ships despatched in search of Franklin.
He was followed up by Kane in the _Advance_, fitted out in 1853 by
the munificence of two American citizens, Grinnell and Peabody. Kane
worked his way right through Smith Sound and Robeson Channel into
the sea named after him. For two years he continued investigating
Grinnell Land and the adjacent shores of Greenland. Subsequent
investigations by Hayes in 1860, and Hall ten years later, kept
alive the interest in Smith Sound and its neighbourhood; and in
1873 three ships were despatched under Captain (afterwards Sir
George) Nares, who nearly completed the survey of Grinnell Land,
and one of his lieutenants, Pelham Aldrich, succeeded in reaching
82.48° N. About the same time, an Austrian expedition under Payer
and Weyprecht explored the highest known land, much to the east,
named by them Franz Josef Land, after the Austrian Emperor.

[Illustration: NORTH POLAR REGION--EASTERN HALF.]

Simultaneously interest in the northern regions was aroused by
the successful exploit of the north-east passage by Professor
(afterwards Baron) Nordenskiold, who had made seven or eight voyages
in Arctic regions between 1858 and 1870. He first established the
possibility of passing from Norway to the mouth of the Yenesei
in the summer, making two journeys in 1875-76. These have since
been followed up for commercial purposes by Captain Wiggins, who
has frequently passed from England to the mouth of the Yenesei in
a merchant vessel. As Siberia develops there can be little doubt
that this route will become of increasing commercial importance.
Professor Nordenskiold, however, encouraged by his easy passage
to the Yenesei, determined to try to get round into Behring Strait
from that point, and in 1878 he started in the _Vega_, accompanied
by the _Lena_, and a collier to supply them with coal. On the 19th
August they passed Cape Chelyuskin, the most northerly point of the
Old World. From here the _Lena_ appropriately turned its course
to the mouth of its namesake, while the _Vega_ proceeded on her
course, reaching on the 12th September Cape North, within 120 miles
of Behring Strait; this cape Cook had reached from the east in 1778.
Unfortunately the ice became packed so closely that they could
not proceed farther, and they had to remain in this tantalising
condition for no less than ten months. On the 18th July 1879 the
ice broke up, and two days later the _Vega_ rounded East Cape with
flying colours, saluting the easternmost coast of Asia in honour
of the completion of the north-east passage. Baron Nordenskiold
has since enjoyed a well-earned leisure from his arduous labours
in the north by studying and publishing the history of early
cartography, on which he has issued two valuable atlases, containing
fac-similes of the maps and charts of the Middle Ages.

General interest thus re-aroused in Arctic exploration brought about
a united effort of all the civilised nations to investigate the
conditions of the Polar regions. An international Polar Conference
was held at Hamburg in 1879, at which it was determined to surround
the North Pole for the years 1882-83 by stations of scientific
observation, intended to study the conditions of the Polar Ocean. No
less than fifteen expeditions were sent forth; some to the Antarctic
regions, but most of them round the North Pole. Their object was
more to subserve the interest of physical geography than to promote
the interest of geographical discovery; but one of the expeditions,
that of the United States under Lieutenant A. W. Greely, again took
up the study of Smith Sound and its outlets, and one of his men,
Lieutenant Lockwood, succeeded in reaching 83.24° N., within 450
miles of the Pole, and up to that time the farthest north reached
by any human being. The Greely expedition also succeeded in showing
that Greenland was not so much ice-capped as ice-surrounded.

Hitherto the universal method by which discoveries had been made
in the Polar regions was to establish a base at which sufficient
food was cached, then to push in any required direction as far as
possible, leaving successive caches to be returned to when provisions
fell short on the forward journey. But in 1888, Dr. Fridjof Nansen
determined on a bolder method of investigating the interior of
Greenland. He was deposited upon the east coast, where there were
no inhabitants, and started to cross Greenland, his life depending
upon the success of his journey, since he left no reserves in the
rear and it would be useless to return. He succeeded brilliantly
in his attempt, and his exploit was followed up by two successive
attempts of Lieutenant Peary in 1892-95, who succeeded in crossing