Classic Audiobook Collection - The Last Secrets by John Buchan ~ Full Audiobook [history]

Episode Date: January 15, 2024

The Last Secrets by John Buchan audiobook. Genre: history In The Last Secrets (1923), John Buchan turns from spy fiction to the real-world drama of the map's final blank spaces, tracing how early twentieth-century expeditions transformed rumor and legend into surveyed fact. With a storyteller's pace and a geographer's eye, Buchan revisits the great set pieces of a rapidly shrinking world: the long-guarded road to Lhasa, the perilous gorges of the Brahmaputra, the contested dreams of the North and South Poles (with polar chapters contributed by Charles Turley Smith), and the strange equatorial snows of Ruwenzori, the 'Mountains of the Moon.' He ranges on to the high gamble of Mount McKinley, the guarded holy cities of Islam, the hard-won routes through New Guinea's interior, and the early reconnaissance that set the stage for Mount Everest. Across these episodes runs the book's central tension: the irresistible pull of the Unknown versus the bittersweet realization that discovery increasingly means precise measurement, patient logistics, and scientific detail rather than forbidden cities and mythical rivers. The result is both a chronicle of daring journeys and a meditation on why exploration matters when wonder seems to be running out of room. For ad-free listening try our premium subscription Chapters (Approximate) (00:00:00) Chapter 00 (00:06:47) Chapter 01 (00:45:44) Chapter 02 (01:02:12) Chapter 03 (01:42:03) Chapter 04 (02:03:09) Chapter 05 (02:33:52) Chapter 06 (03:09:39) Chapter 07 (03:42:43) Chapter 08 (04:24:05) Chapter 09 (05:01:36) Chapter 10 (05:30:37) Chapter 11 (06:00:02) Chapter 12 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Last Secrets by John Buckin. Dedication and Preface To the memory of Brigadier General Cecil Rowling, CMG, CIE, who fell at the third battle of Epper, an intrepid explorer, a gallant soldier, and the best of friends.

Preface, the first two decades of the 20th century will rank as a most distinguished era in the history of exploration. for during them many of the great geographical riddles of the world have been solved. This book contains a record of some of the main achievements. What Nansen said of polar exploration is true of all exploration. Its story is a mighty manifestation of the power of the unknown over the mind of man.

The unknown, happily, will always be with us, for there are infinite secrets in a blade of grass, an eddy of wind and a grain of dust, and human knowledge will never attain that finality when the sense of wonder shall cease. But to the ordinary man, there is an appeal in large, bold, and obvious conundrums which is lacking in the minutia of research. Thousands of square miles of the globe still awaits surveying and mapping, but most of the exploration of the future will be the elucidation of details. The main, the mainline of the globe, the main lines of the earth's architecture have been determined, and the task is now one of

amplifying our knowledge of the grunning and buttresses and stonework. There are no more unvisited, forbidden cities, or unapproached high mountains, or unrecorded great rivers. The world is disenchanted. Over soon must Europe sender spies through all the land. It is, in a high degree improbable, that many geographical problems remain. The solving of which will come upon the mind with the overwhelming romance of the unveilings we have been privileged to witness. The explorers will still be a noble trade, but it will be a filling up of gaps and a framework of knowledge which we already possess. The morning freshness has gone out of the business, and we are left with the plotting duties of the afternoon. Some of the undertakings

described in these pages have not been completed. The foot of man has not yet, stood on the last snows of Everest or on the summit of Karsden's. One notable discovery I have not dealt with, the great Turfan Depression in the heart of Central Asia, far below the sea level, the existence of which was first established by the Russian Roberoski before the close of the last century, and the details of which have been described by Sir Oriel Stein in his ruins of Desert Cathay and Ser India. But Sir Oral's interest was chiefly in the antiquities of the place, and the more strictly geographical results have not yet been given to the world.

Today, if we survey the continents, we find nothing of which the main features have not already been expounded. The Amazon basin might be regarded as an exception, and only a little while ago, men dreamed of discovering among the wilds of the Bolivian frontier the remains, perhaps even the survival of an ancient civilization. It would appear that these dreams are baseless. The late President Roosevelt did indeed succeed in putting upon the map a new river, the Rio Roosevelt, 1500 kilometers long, of which the upper course was entirely unknown,

and the lower course explored only by a few rubber collectors. A river, which is the chief affluent of the Madeira, which is itself the chief affluent of the Amazon. But now all the tributaries have been traced, and though there is much unexplored ground in the Amazon Valley, it consists of forest tracks lying between the rivers, all more or less alike in their general character, and with nothing to repay the explorer except their flora and fauna. Africa is now an open book, even though many parts have been little traveled. The map of Asia alone holds one blank patch, which may well be the last of the great secrets, the desert of southern Arabia, which lies between Yemen and Oman, 800 by 500 miles of waterless sands.

Long ago there were roots athwart it, and hidden in its recesses some great news may await the traveler. But its crossing will be a hazardous affair for whoever undertakes it, since he will have to lean upon the frail reed of milk camels for food and transport. For the rest, the problems are now of survey and scientific inquiry rather than of exploration in the grand manner. I have many acknowledgments to make. My thanks are due in the first place to Mr. Charles Turley-Smith, who has contributed the chapters on Arctic and Antarctic exploration,

subjects on which he is especially equipped to write. and in order to put the conquest of the two poles in its proper light has supplied a sketch of the long history of polar exploration. I am deeply indented to Mr. Arthur R. Hinks, the secretary, and to Mr. Edward Hewood, the librarian of the Royal Geographical Society, for their help and advice. I have also to express my thanks to Messrs Constable and Company for permission to reproduce illustrations

and to quote from works published by them. To Major G.H. Putnam and Messer Sili, service and company for the same kindness. To Major F.M. Bailey, C.I.E. and the British political office in Sikkim for the story of the Brahmaputra Gorge's. And to my friends of the Mount Everest Committee for their assent to my use of their beautiful photographs

of that mountain. J.B. End of dedication and preface. Chapter 1 of The Last Secrets by John Buckin. This Libra Box recording is in the public domain. Chapter 1, Lassa. Till the summer of 1904, if one had been asked what was the most mysterious spot on the earth's surface, the reply would have been Lassa.

It was a place on which no Englishman had cast an eye for a hundred years, and no white man for more than half a century. In our prosaic modern world, there remained one city among the clouds about which no tale was too strange for belief. The greatest of the mountain barrier shut it off from the south, and on the north it was guarded by leagues of waterless desert.

Explorer after explorer had set out on the quest, but all had stopped short before the golden roofs of the sacred city could be seen from any hilltop. Even in the early days the place had never been explored, for the visitors had been jealously watched and hurried quickly away. In the Potala might be treasures of a culture long hidden to the world, lost treatises of Aristotle, unknown Greek poems, relics perhaps of the mystic kingdom of Kubla Khan, riches of gold

and jewels drawn from the four corners of Asia. And then, suddenly in 1904 we went there, not as apologetic travelers taken by side paths, but as an armed force marching along the highway to the very heart of the mystery, and letting loose at once upon the world a flood of accurate knowledge. For a moment, we were carried centuries away from high politics and every modern invention, and were back in the great ages of discovery, with the port of the port of the port of the world. with the Portuguese in their quest for O'Fear or Prestor John, or with Raleigh looking from Manoa the Golden.

It was impossible for the least sentimental to avoid a certain regret for the drawing back of that curtain, which had meant so much to the imagination of mankind. The shrinkage of the world goes on so fast, our horizon grows so painfully clear that the old, untiring wonder which cast its glamour over the ways of our predecessors is vanishing from the lives of their descendants. With the unveiling of Lhasa fell the last stronghold of the older romance.

Tibet had always been a forbidden land, and as a rule, adventurers only penetrated its fringes. Somewhere about the year 1328, a certain friar-Oderick of Pordonon traveling from Cathay is said to have entered Lhasa. and in the middle of the 16th century, for now Mendez Pinto may have reached it. In 1661, the Jesuits, Gruber, and De Orville made a journey from Peking to Lhasa, and thence by way of Nepal and to India. In the early part of the 18th century, there was a temporary unveiling, and a Capuchin mission was established in the Holy City. Various Jesuits also reached a place, notably one,

is a dairy. And in 1730 came Sanuel van der Putt, a doctor of Laws of Leiden, who stayed long enough to learn the language. In 1745, the Capuchin mission came to an end and the curtain descended. In 1774, George Bogle of the East India Company was in Tibet on a mission from Warren Hastings, but the first Englishman did not reach Lassa till 1811, when Thomas Manning, of Caius College, Cambrid, a friend of Charles Lamb, arrived and stayed for five months

on his unsuccessful journey from Calcutta to Peking. Till 1904, Manning was the solitary Englishman who was known for certain to have entered the sacred city, though there was a tale of one William Warcroft reaching the place in 1826

and living there for 12 years in disguise. In 1844, the French mission and Ghabit reached Lhasa from China and recorded their experiences in one of the most delightful of all books of travel. They were the last Europeans to have the privilege up to the entry of the British Army. But throughout the last half of the 19th century, Indian natives and the government service were employed in the survey of Tibet, men of the type of babu whom Mr. Kipling has described in Kim.

The whole business was kept strictly secret. The agents were known only by the letters of the alphabet, and when they crossed the Tibetan borders, they were aware that they had passed beyond the protection of the British Raj. More than one reached Lhasa by fantastic routes, with a result that the Indian government had accurate information about the city filed in its archives, while the world at large knew the place

only from the history of Huckkengebe, and from the drawing of the Potala made by Gruber in the 17th century. Of the later European travelers, none reached the capital. Mr. Littledale in 1895 was not stopped by the Tibetan authorities till he was within 50 miles of the city, and Sven Heiden in 1901 got within 14 days of Lhasa from the north. But meantime, events were happening, which were to impel the government of India to interfere more

actively in Tibetan policy than by merely sending native agents to collect news. The traditional policy was to preserve Tibet as a sanctuary, but a sanctuary is only a sanctuary if all the neighbors combined to hold it inviolate. In 1903, the position of Britain and Tibet was like that of a big boy at school who was tormented by an impertinent youngster. He bears it for some time, but at last is compelled to have. administer chastisement. The Convention of 1890 and the trade regulations of 1893 were outraged by the Tibetans in many of their provisions. Our letters of protest were returned unopened, and since news travels fast upon the frontier, our protected peoples began to wonder what made the British Raj so

tolerant of ill-treatment. This was bad enough for our prestige in the East, but the danger became acute when we discovered that the Dalai Lama was in treaty with Russia, and that an avowed Russian agent, one Dorjev, was in residence at his court. The two powers in Lhasa were the Dalai Lama, who speedily fell under Russian influence, and the Tsongdu, or council composed of representatives of the great priestly caste, who suspected all innovations and were in favor of maintaining the traditional policy of exclusion against Russia and Britain alike. China, though the nominal suzerain was impotent, her viceroy the amban being partially insulted by both parties. In these circumstances, Britain could only make arrangements by going direct to headquarters.

Dorjeff had played his cards with great skill and seemed to be winning everywhere. The Dalai Lama was holy with him and had received from the Tsar a complete set of vestments of a bishop of the Greek church. The Russian monarch was recognized as a Bodhisat incarnation, representing no less a person than Song Kappa, the Luther of Lamaism. And Russia was popularly believed to be a Buddhist power, or at any rate the sworn protector of the Buddhist faith. It is difficult to overestimate the significance of these doings. But at the same time, Russian influence was rather potential than actual.

The Cossacks, who accompanied Sven Hedden, were headed off from the Holy City as vigorously as any English explorer, and the tales of arming with Russian rifles which filtered through to India, were rather intelligent anticipations than records of facts. There were thus two parties in Tibet, pulling against each other, but both in different ways hostile to our interests. The Dalai Lama and Dorjieff favored a deposition. departure from the traditional Tibetan policy in favor of Russia. The Songdu and the Lamaist hierarchy in general were all for exclusion, but in their willfulness declined to observe treaties or behave with neighborly honesty. This internal strife, which alone made possible the success of our expedition, also made its dispatch inevitable, for neither party was prepared to listen to any argument but force.

Few enterprises have ever been undertaken by Britain more unwillingly, and her decision was only arrived at under the compulsion of stark necessity. There were many who reprobated what they assumed to be a violation of the sacred places of an ancient, pure, and Pacific religion, but there was no need for compunction on that score, since Islamism was the grossest perversion of Buddhism in all Asia. spiritually it had more kinship with the aboriginal devil worship of Tibet than with a gentle greed of Gautama practically it was a political tyranny of monks who battened upon a mild and industrious population and ruled them with coarse theological terrors a reception by the monasteries was sufficiently gruff but to the common people we came rather in the guise of friends in july

1903, Colonel Young Husband, as he was then, Mr. White and Captain O'Connor went to the Cambajong, a place in southern Tibet, just north of Sycambe. There they met the abbot of Tashil Hunpo and certain emissaries from Lhasa,

but nothing could be done. And with the concurrence of the Indian office, it was arranged that a mission should go to Guyanxi, the chief town of southern Tibet, accompanied by a small escorting force. while troops were being collected the commissioner colonel young husband went to tuna on the bleak plain above the tang loch where he waited through three weary winter months meanwhile general macdonald a soldier who had had a distinguished record in central africa took up his quarters at chumby while major betherton the chief transport and supply officer accumulated stores in that valley and prepared the line of communications

those were anxious months of waiting for the mission for the tibetans were in force in the neighborhood and daily threatened to attack the small post but nothing happened till the escort joined them in the end of march nineteen o four and all things were ready for the advance it is worth while looking back upon the road to tuna from the plains of bengal surely one of the most wonderful of the great north roads of the world at silaguri the little toy railway to darjeeling runs up the hillside but the path for the troops lay along the gorge of the teister river through forest of sal and gurgian which give place and turn to teak and bamboo till the altitude increases in the tree-furn and ryeh and rhododendron take their places, and at last the pines are reached, and the fringe of the snows is near. From the glorious subtropical vegetation of Gangtok, the capital of Sikkim, the road runs through difficult ravines till it passes the tree line at Leggap and climbs over the frozen summit of the Natula. From this point, Tibet is visible, with the majestic snows of Tumulhari hanging like a cloud in the north. Then you descend to the Chumbai Valley, the debatable land of Tibet, where stands Ta Carpo

the great white rock, which recalls a famous passage in the Odyssey. Right under Chumohari and just south of the Tanglau lies Farajong, the first of the minor Tibetan fortaleases, which looks as if it were a bad copy of some European model. A little farther and you are over the pass and on the great plateau of Tuna, where I icy winds blow from the hills and drive the gritty soil and blizzards about the traveler. There are a few places in the world where in so short a time, so complete a climatic and scenic change can be experienced. On the 31st of March, the expedition left Tuna,

and after an unfortunate encounter with the Tibetans, which cost the latter many lives, and in which Mr. Edmund Candler, the distinguished war correspondent, was wounded, the enemy made a further stand at red idle gorge nothing of importance however occurred till the town of gangsy was reached and occupied without a shot very soon it became apparent that no more could be done here than at cambogong and the government of india were obliged to sanction a farther advance to lasa for this preparations must be made so the commissioner with a small escort took up his quarter-as-a-lawful to the commissioner with a small escort took up his quarter-a-lawful at Guyingtze, while General MacDonald returned to Chambai for reinforcements. The Jong was found to be deserted, but unfortunately was neither held nor destroyed, the mission residing in the plain below. At first, the waiting among those iris-clad meadows was pleasant and idyllic enough.

The country people brought abundant supplies, and members of the staff rode through the neighborhood and had tea with various dignitaries of the church. But early in May, things took a turn for the worse. It was reported that the Tibetans were fortifying the Kerala the next pass on the Lhasa Road, and since it is the first principle of frontier warfare to strike quickly, Colonel Brander was dispatched with a larger part of the garrison to disperse them. He performed the task with conspicuous success, and the incident is remarkable for one of the strangest pieces of fighting in our military history.

it was necessary to infallade a sangar in which the enemy was ensconced and a native officer wasawa sing with twelve gherkas was detached for the work they climbed up by means of cracks and chimneys up a fifteen hundred foot cliff an exploit which would have done credit to any alpine club even if the climbers had not been cumbered with weapons exposed to fire and laboring at a height of nearly nineteen thousand feet During the engagement, disquieting news arrived from Jiangzi that the Jong had been reoccupied by the enemy and that the mission was undergoing a continuous bombardment. Colonel Brander hurried back to find that the world had moved fast in his absence

and that there was a new type of Tibetan army to be faced. A type possessed of both dash and persistence with some notion of strategy and with guns which, at short range, could do real execution. So began the blockade of the mission house. An imperfect blockade for the telegraph wires remained intact. The mail was delivered with fair regularity,

and the besieged endured no special privations. The honors, said Mr. Percival Landon, were pretty evenly divided. Neither Tibetans nor we were able to storm the other's defenses. A mutual fuselade compelled each side to protect its occupants, by an elaborate system of traverses, and straying beyond the narrow tracks of the fortifications was on either side severely discouraged by the other. An attempt to cut our communications failed, and by the capture of Paula, the garrison greatly

strengthened its position. Our troops had an experience of the type of fighting which has scarcely been known since the great sackings of the Thirty Years' War. In an upland country, we expect attacks on fortified hilltops and long-range encounters such as we saw in South Africa. But in an episode like the capture of Naini, it was a medieval street fighting that we had to face. The castle of Atronto provided no more endless labyrinths than those of Tibetan monasteries. Bands of desperate swordsmen were found in knots under trap doors and behind sharp turnings. They would not surrender and had to be killed by rifle-listers. shots fired at a distance of a few feet.

On the 26th June, General McDonald arrived with a relieving force, and soon after came the Tongs of Penlop, the temporal ruler of Bhutan, a genial potentate, enriched, varicolored robes and a Hamburg hat. The Tibetan offensive had weakened, but the Zhang had to be taken before the mission could advance. Down the middle of the precipitous southeastern face of the great rock ran a deep thick, and fissure across which walls had been built. It was decided to breach these walls by our gunfire and then to attack by way of the cleft. The actual assault was a brilliant and intrepid exploit

for which Lieutenant Grant of the 8th Gurkhas most deservedly received the Victoria Cross. With our guns battering the walls above, he and his men scrambled up the ravine, while masses of rubble poured down on them, and every now and then carried off a man. then the Gurkhas bugles warned the guns to cease, and the last climb began up a face so steep that there was no possible shelter from the enemy's fire. By such desperate mountaineering, the invaders at last reached the wreckage of the Tibetan wall. Grant and one of the Gurkhas were the first two men over, and to the observers below their deaths seemed a certainty. They were two against the whole enemy force in the Jong, and had the Tibetans reserved their fire and waited

at the bastions, they could have picked off every man of the assault as his head appeared above the breach. But the bold course proved the wise one, and presently the garrison surrendered. Rarely has the Victoria Cross been better earned, and it is satisfactory to know that Lieutenant Grant reap the reward of perfect fearlessness and received almost. a slight wound. On the 14th of July, the expedition moved out from Guyanxi along the road to Lhasa. Grass and a glory of flowers covered the glens which led up to the Kerala. The serious fighting was over, and the second crossing of that pass was remarkable only for the fact that some rock platforms and caves had to be cleared by our panting troops at an altitude of over 19,000 feet.

In the rest of the story, the soldier finds little place, and the interest attaches itself to the derbars of the commissioner and the treasure house of natural and artistic wonders which the mission was approaching. For after Giansy, the resistance of the Tibetans was at an end. Half sullenly and half curiously, they permitted our advance, delaying us a little with fruitless negotiations while in loss of the game of high politics which the Dalai Lama had played was turning against him, and like another deity, he was meditating a pilgrimage. After the Karolaw came the Yamdok, or as some call it, the Utsos or Turquoise Lake, the most wonderful natural feature of the plateau.

Its curious shape, its pale blue waters, its shores of white sand, fringed with dog roses and forget-me-nots, The cloud of fable, which has always brooded over it, and its august environment make it unique among the lakes of the world. I quote a fragment of Mr. Landon's description. Below lie both the outer and the inner lakes, this following with the counter indentations in the in and out windings of the other shoreline. The mass and color of the purple distance is Scotland at our best. Scotland too in the slow drift of a slant-roofed rain-cloud in among the hills. At one's feet the water is like that of the Lake of Geneva.

But the tattered outline of the beach, with its projecting lines of needle-rocks, its wide white curving sand-spits, its jagged islets, its precipitous spurs, and above all the mysterious tarns strung one beyond another into the heart of the hills, all these are the amdoc's own and not another's. If you are lucky, you may see the snowy slopes of Toonang gartered by the waters, and always on the horizon are the everlasting ice fields of the Himalayas, bitterly ringing with argent and sun and color of the still blue lake. You will not ask for the added glories of a Tibetan sunset.

The gray spin and scatter of a rain-threaded afterglow, or the tangled sweep of a thunder-cloud's edge against the blue will give you all you wish, and you will have had seen the finest view in all this strange land." On the shore lies the convent of Samding, the home of the Dorgy Fagmo or Pig Goddess, which was jealously respected by the troops since its abbess had nursed Chandredas one of the adventurous agents of the Indian government

when he fell sick during his travels. The present incarnation, a little girl of six, declined to reveal herself. Nothing was more satisfactory in the whole tale of the expedition than the way in which any service done at any time to a British subject, white or black, met with full recognition. Such conduct cannot have failed to have raised the prestige of the power which showed itself so mindful of its servants.

Prestige and reputation of a kind, indeed, we already possessed. The Tibetan monasteries had a trick of sending their most valuable belongings to the nearest convent, for, they argued, the English do not enter nunneries or war with women. On July 24, the expedition crossed the Kumbala and descended to the broad green valley of the Tsengpo. The crossing of that river, a work of real difficulty, was made tragic by the death of Major Beatherton, the brilliant transport officer, to whom, perhaps more than to any other

soldier, the military success in the enterprise was due. Not the least of the mysteries of Tibet was this secret stream, which the traveler, after miles of bleak upland, finds flowing among English woods and meadows. And Assem and Bengal, it was the Brahmaputra, but when it entered the hills, it was as unknown to a civilized man as alf or the four rivers of Eden. What its middle course was like, and how it broke through the mountain barrier were questions which no one had answered, nor at the time was there any accurate knowledge of its upper valleys. Once on the North Bank, Lassa was but a short way off, and in growing excitement the expedition covered the last stages. It was one of the great moments of life,

and we can all understand and envy the final hurried miles, till through the haze the eye caught the gleam of golden roofs and white terraces. The first prospect brought no disappointment. If the streets were squalid, they were set in a green plain seen with waters. Trees and gardens were everywhere, while above the huge, a Ceci-like citadel of the Potala typified the massive secrecy of generations, and the ring of dark hills reminded the onlooker that this garden ground was planted on the roof of the world. Meanwhile, the expedition set itself down outside the gates to abide the pleasure of the sullen and perturred masters. The deity of the place had gone on a journey. No one quite knew whither. He had kept his moonlight flitting a secret and had gone off on the northern road with Dorjev and

a small escort to claim the hospitality of his spiritual brother of Urga. He had played his impossible game, with spirit and subtlety, and he had a pretty taste for romance in its ending. When one looks for mystery and Lassa, wrote Mr. Candler, one's thoughts dwell solely on the Dalai Lama and the Potala. I cannot help dwelling on the flight of the 13th incarnation. It plunges us into medievalism. To my mind, there is no picture so engrossing in modern history as that exodus when the spiritual head of the Buddhist church

the temporal ruler of six millions stole out of his palace by night and was born away in his palanquin. The romance which Mr. Candler saw in the Potala, Mr. Langdon found most conspicuously in the Church of the Jokang. The palace was magnificent from the outside, but within it was only a warrant of small rooms and broken stairways. The great cathedral, on the other hand, was hidden away among the trees and streets, so that its golden roof could only be seen from a distance, but inside it was a shrine of all that was mysterious and splendid. The contrast was allegorical of the difference between the temporal ruler of Lamaism, gadi, tyrannical, and hollow,

and the sway of the Buddhist Church, which by hidden waves and unseen agencies dominated the imagination of Asia. The Chinese amban, having a natural desire to pay back the people who had so grossly neglected him, invited certain members of the mission to enter this holy of holies. The visitors were the first white men to approach the inner sanctuary of the Buddhist faith.

They were stoned on leaving the building, but the site was one worth risking much to see. In the central shrine sat the great golden Buddha, roped with jewels, crowned with turquoise and pearl, surrounded by dim, rough-hewned shapes which loomed out fitfully in the glare of the butterlamps, while the maroon-clad monks droned their eternal chant before the silver altar, and the statue was as strange as its environment.

Quote, for this is no ordinary presentation of the master. The features are smooth and almost childish. Beautiful, they are not, but there is no need of beauty here. There is no trace of that inscrutable smile, which, from Mudkin to Salon, as inseparable, from our conception of the features of the great teacher. Here there is nothing of the saddened smile of the melancholia, who has known too much and has renounced it all as vanity.

Here, instead, is the quiet happiness and the quick capacity for pleasure of the boy who had never yet known either pain or disease or death. It is Gautama as a pure and eager prince without any thought for the morrow or care for today. in quote Mr. Landon has other pictures of almost equal charm He takes us to the famous Ling Kor, The sacred road which encircled the town Worned with the feet of generations of men seeking salvation

We see the unclean abode of the Raggiabas That strange unholy cast of beggar scavengers We walk in the gardens of the Lucang By the Willow Fringed Lake and the glades of velvet turf and not least we visit the temple of the chief wizard, where every form of human torment is delicately portrayed in fresco and carving. But if we wish to realize the savagery at the heart of this proud theocracy, we must go with Mr. Candler to the neighboring Dupong Monastery on the quest for supplies

and see the tribe of inquisitors buzzing out like angry wasps and submitting only when the guns were trained on them. for these weeks of waiting in lausa were an anxious time for all concerned our own position was precarious in the extreme and had the lawson's once realized it impossible winter was approaching the government was urging the mission to get its treaty and come home and yet day after day had to pass without result and the commissioner could only wait and opposed to the obstinacy of the monks a stronger and quieter determination Sir Francis' young husband was indeed almost the only man in the empire fitted for the task. He sat through every Durbar, says Mr. Candler, a monument of patience and inflexibility, impassive as one of their own Buddhas. Priests and counselors found that appeals to his mercy were hopeless. He too had orders from his king to go to Lassa. If he faltered, his life also was at stake.

Decapitation would await him on his return. That was the impression he purposely gave them. It curtailed Palliver. How in the name of all their Buddhas were they to stop such a man? At last on 1st September, when after a month's diplomacy, the Tibetans had only admitted two of our demands, the time came to deliver our ultimatum. The delegates were told that if all our terms were not accepted

within a week, General MacDonald would consider the question of using stronger arguments. Our forbearance was justified by its results, for the opposition suddenly subsided and we gained what we asked without any coercion. It was a diplomatic triumph of a high order obtained in the face of difficulties which seemed to put diplomacy out of the question. The final scene came on 7th September, when in the audience chamber of the Pothala, the treaty was signed by the commissioner and by the acting regent who affixed the seal of the Dalai Lama, the four Chappes, a representative of the Song-Doo, and the heads of the great monasteries. Thereafter came a limelight photograph of the gathering, and with this very modern climax, the great Asian mystery became a thing of the past.

the Dalai Lama had already been formally deposed, his spiritual powers were transferred to our friend Atasha Lama, and with a treaty in our baggage and real prestige in our wake, we began the homeward march. What were the results of the expedition? Geographically, they appeared a little barren, for we stuck too close to the high road to solve many of the greater mysteries. One fact of cardinal importance was established, our concept of tibet was revolutionized and instead of an arid plateau we learned that about one-third of it was nearly as fertile and well-watered as cashmere for the rest the two most interesting expeditions were forbidden down into the brahmaputra to asam and to the mountains nine days north of lasa which had formed the southern limit of sven hayden's exploration one valuable expedition was however undertaken western tibet had hitherto been the best known part of the table-land and now our knowledge of it was linked on to the lassen district on tenth october captains rider rowling and wood and lieutenant bailey with six

left guangsee and made their way by shagatsi up to the tsangpo they explored the river to its source and passing the great manasarawar lakes arrived at gartok on the upper indus thence they entered the soot-leged valley and crossing the ship-key pass of over eighteen thousand feet reached simla in the first week of january nineteen o five much was added to our knowledge of the camillea the fact was established that the old reports of northern rivals to everest was unfounded and moreover the highest mountains in the world was seen from the northern side where the slopes are easier and the possibility of an attempt on it occurred to various minds a hope which 17 years later was realized. On the political side, the true achievement was not the formal treaty, but the going to Lhasa. We taught the Tibetans that their mysterious capital could not be shut against our troops, and that Russian promises were less real than British performances.

We showed ourselves strong, and above all things humane, and we earned respect, and it would also appear, a kind of affection. When the venerable regent solemnly blessed the commissioner and General MacDonald for their clemency, and presented each with a golden image of the Buddha, an honor rarely granted to the faithful and never before to an unbeliever, he gave expression to the general feelings of the people. Tibet was enveloped once more in its old seclusion, a deeper seclusion, indeed, since we guaranteed it. A final result was that we vindicated our claim to protect our subjects, and those who served us. We took our Gurkhas into the forbidden land, which their native traditions had

invested with a miraculous power, and showed them the truth. As for Bhutan, up to 1904, it was as obscure as Tibet, and its people were strangers. They were now, in the commissioner's phrase, our enthusiastic allies. Their ruler and his Homburg hat joined us in the march, and acted as master of ceremonies and introducing us to the Lhasa Notables. Nearly 20 years have passed and much water has since run under the bridges. In 1906, China adhered to the treaty and in 1907 came the Anglo-Russian Convention, which provided for the secluding of the country by both powers and recognized China's suzerain rights. In 1909, the Dalai Lama, who had been restored, was ejected by China. Chinese troops, and in 1910 he was at Darjeeling, a refugee claiming our hospitality.

Once again he was reinstated, and he has ever since been a faithful ally of Britain. At the outbreak of the Great War, he offered 1,000 Tibetan troops and informed the king that lamas through the length and breadth of Tibet were praying for the success of the British arms and for the happiness of the souls of the fallen. Since 1904, both China and Russia have crumbled into anarchy. There is no peril to India through the eastern Himalayan passes, and the strategic importance of Tibet has dwindled. It is still a forbidden country, but it is no longer a secret one.

Posts run regularly to Lhasa, and a telegraph line has been laid to that mysterious capital. But it is mysterious only by a literary, convention. The true mystery is gone. The secret, such as it was, has been revealed, and the human mind can no longer play with the unknown. Child Rowland had reached the dark tower and found it not so marvelous after all. It is hard not to sympathize with Mr. Chandler's plaint. Quote, There are no more forbidden cities which men have not mapped than photographed. Our children will laugh at modern travelers' tales. They will have to turn again soon to Gulliver and Harun al-Rashid,

and they will soon tire of these. For now that there are no real mysteries, no unknown land of dreams where there may still be genie and Mahatmas and bottle-imps, that kind of literature will be tolerated no longer. Children will be skeptical and matter-of-fact and disillusioned, and there will be no sale for fairy stories anymore. but we ourselves our children, why could we not have left at least one city out of bounds? These reflections do not detract from the romance of the expedition itself and the privilege of the fortunate men who shared in it.

For them it was assuredly a great adventure, one which could never be repeated. It may be summed up, as Mr. Landon has summed it up, in certain famous lines from the Odyssey, which have not only a curious local application, but embody the true spirit of adventure. Over the tides of ocean, on they pressed, on past the great white rock beside the stream,

on till through God's high bastions east and west, they reached the plains with pale-starred iris dressed, and found at last the folk of whom men dream. Into chapter one. Chapter 2 of The Last Secrets by John Buckin This Libra box recording is in the public domain. Chapter 2 The Gorges of the Brahmaputra 50 years ago, one of the questions most debated among geographers

was the origin of the Brahmaputra. The Great River, navigable for 800 miles from its mouth, was familiar enough in its course through the plains of India. but it flowed from the wild abhor country, and no part of the Indian borders was less known than those northeastern foothills. Meantime, in Tibet, north of the main chain of the Himalayas, there was a large river that Sang Po flowing from west to east. Did the Sang Po ultimately become the Brahmaputra? Or did it flow into the Irawaddy, or even into the Yangtze Kiyang? All three views were held, but there was no evidence to decide between them. In 1874, a native explorer, the pundit Nain Singh,

started on his famous journey from Le to Lh to Lhasa and was instructed, if possible, to follow the Tsang Po and see where it went. He reached Lhasa, and, on his return, struck the Sang Poe at at Sitang well to the east of the point where the British expedition crossed in 1904. He followed its course for 30 miles farther down, but was prevented from continuing his journey and compelled to return by the direct route to India. In 1878, another native explorer, GMN, seems to have followed the Sengpo down as far as Giala, which is not far from the point where the river turns sharply to the south, but his reports were not considered reliable. In 1884, another native, Kyntham, succeeded in following the Tsangpo to a point called Pemakucheng. There he found an enormous gorge

and was compelled to make a detour out to the north and east, rejoining the stream where it entered the Abor country. Kintrup's report was of the highest interest. He had stood at the beginning of an apparently impassable gorge, and he reported a fall at Pimakochung of 150 feet. He was, however, quite illiterate and was only able to make his report from memory, and it presently appeared that the height might be only 50 feet, and that the higher fall was not in fact a mainstream, but a small tributary. One fact, however, of the utmost importance had been established by his expedition. The Sang Po was, beyond reasonable doubt, the Brahmaputra in its upper course.

The Lhasa expedition in 1904 would fain have traced the river to the plains had not the government interposed a veto. In the years that followed, the source of the Tsangpo was discovered by Captain Rawling. In 1911, the Abor expedition increased our knowledge of the course of the Brahmaputra, right up to the skirts of the main range. The problem now was not the linking up of the Tsang Po and the Brahmaputra, but what happened to the river in the hairpin bend between Pemakochung and its debauchment in the Abor valleys. The elevation of the stream at the point where the main road Delasa crossed it was in the neighborhood of 12,000 feet. From there, as far as Pima Cochong, we knew that there was no very

great loss in altitude, but when the Brahmaputra appeared in the Ebor foothills, it was only between 1,000 and 2,000 feet above the sea. The stretch of unknown course was perhaps 200 miles, and in that section the rivers broke through the main range of the Himalaya. It was possible, nay, it was probable that somewhere in those gorges, which Kintap had thought impassable, lay hidden the most tremendous waterfall in the world. The secret of the Brahmaputra gorges was one of the topics that most fascinated geographers between the years 1904 and 1913. In that latter year, the mystery was solved.

and the ignotum proved not to be the magnificum. This is the story of the solution. The course of the Brahmaputra through Assam is roughly from northeast to southwest, but at a place called Satya, the mainstream, they're known as the Daihang, turns sharply to the north. At that point, too, it receives an important tributary on its left bank called the Daibang. During the winter of 1912 to 1913, Captain F.M. Bailey, an officer of the Indian Political Service, was employed by the government to survey the Daibong Basin, while another party had gone through

the Abar country to survey the Daihung. Early in 1913, Captain Bailey and Captain Morse head of the Royal Engineers collected what stores they could and started off from the village of Mipi on the upper waters of the Their aim was to cross into the Daihang Valley and to follow the river upstream to the Tibetan plateau. Captain Bailey had been with the Lhasa expedition and had a long record of exploration in different parts of Tibet, so he had all the qualifications needed by the pioneer. But his party was imperfectly equipped, since it started more or less on the spur of the moment, and had had no time to obtain proper stores from India.

trusted to the prestige won by the Abor expedition and his experience of the ways of the Tibetans to furnish him with coolies and local supplies. The reader's attention is now prayed for the map. The first business was to cross the high passes separating the Dai Bang from the Dai Hang. The weather proved abominable and for part of the route only half rations could be issued. As they descended into the valley of the Daihang, they descended into the valley of the Daihang, they found once more cultivation in villages, and they were able to supplement their stores by shooting game, especially pheasants, which teemed by the roadside. It was necessary to establish touch with the Abor survey party lower down the river, and accordingly they had to halt for some days. At a place

called Capu, they managed to take the altitude in the riverbed and found the height above sea level to be 2,610 feet, an important result, for they were able to take no other observation at water level below the main gorges. These foothills of the Himalaya were inhabited chiefly by savage tribes akin to the Abors, who were known generically as Lopas. But as the expedition advanced up the river, they came to the country of the Pobas, who were under Tibetan influence. At Lagung, which is about the center of the hairpin bend, the course of the river turned west. It might have been possible for them to have followed it some 30 miles farther, but they were pressed by a Poba official, with whom they made friends to go northeast into the absolutely unknown country of Pome, which would enable them to

make a circuit and reach Giala at the head of the gorges. Captain Bailey considered that it would be easier to explore the gorges by going downstream. On the 21st of June they crossed a pass of over 13,000 feet into the valley of the river known as the Po Tsang Po, an affluent of the Brahmaputra. It was a stream 80 yards wide and of such rapidity that its current was one whirl of foam. The natives were in great fear of the Chinese, and it was necessary to go boldly to Shoa, the capital, where a letter could be received from the Abor Survey Party vouching for their respectability. The Chinese had burned the place, killed the chief, and decapitated the council, and the

inhabitants looked askance at the travelers because of the Chinese writing on a tablet of Indian ink which they carried. After three days, however, a letter arrived from the Abor Party which persuaded them that Captain Bailey and Captain Morsehead were, at any rate servants of the English king. The explorers now moved northeastwards down the Po Tsang Pole, finding great difficulty in crossing the tributaries where the bridges had mostly been destroyed. It was a beautiful land, bright with primula, iris, and blue poppy, and the roads were lined with raspberries. They were now leaving the Pohme country and traveling among a more civilized type of Tibetan, who wore hats like clergymen made out of yak's hair. After crossing a pass of over 15,000 feet, they returned to

the mainstream of the Tsang Po. This country was under the charge of Tsong Pen of Tzela, who came to meet the travelers, an urbane gentleman whose son was at rugby and a promising cricketeer. They were now on the Tsang Po above the mysterious gorges. They had left behind them the hot valleys of the lower stream and found a dry Tibetan dale where the chief crops were barley and buckwheat. The river was broad and slow, at one point stretching into a lake 600 yards wide, and its altitude was 9,680 feet. The problem was now to follow it down from that point to the point of their last observation where the altitude was only 2,610 feet. Somewhere in the intervening tract of Gorge, make the enormous descent of over 7,000 feet.

The first stage was the 22 miles down to Giala, which had been visited in 1878. The stream was in flood owing to melting snows, and the waterside track was difficult. Four days' March below Giala, they reached Pima Cochung, the limit of Kintrup's exploration. So far, they had passed various small rapids, but nothing in the nature of a fall. A mile below Pima Cochung, they came on Kintrup's Cascade. It proved to be only some 30 feet high and not vertical. The road now became extraordinarily intricate. Great spurs ran down to the river and blocked the glen,

and it was necessary to cut paths through dense forests and thickets of rhododendron to surmount them. There was no track of any kind, and the tributaries descending from the adjacent glaciers were often hard to cross. They ran short of food and could get no reliable information as to the possibility of their descending the stream. Captain Moorshead and the coolies accordingly returned to Gala, and Captain Bailey, with one man and 15 pounds of flour, attempted to descend the Tsang Po by the route which a party of Monbas was said to have recently taken. He found the Monbos, but they were wild and suspicious and far from helpful.

They refused to take him to their village. and declined to show him the road around the difficult cliffs. Apparently, they considered that a traveler who had only one servant and who carried most of his baggage himself must be a person of small importance and not worth troubling about. He managed, however, to pick up from them certain news about the lower valley. He returned to Giala and rejoined Captain Moorshead, and they proceeded to piece their knowledge together.

At Giala a small stream drops from the cliffs making a waterfall in which the god Shinchi Chogya is concealed. The image of the deity is carved or painted in the rock behind the fall, but it is only possible to see it in winter when there is little water. This apparently was Kintrup's fall of 150 feet. Now, why should so meager a natural feature have attained such celebrity among the Tibetans for the fame of it has spread far and wide over the country. The reason seems to be that it is unique because there are no other high falls. Had this deduction been made from Kintraps' evidence, the mystery of the Brahmaputra gorgias would have been solved long ago. The travelers collected their observations on the altitude to the river level and the speed of the current. At

pay, where they first struck the Tsang Po, the height was 9,680. feet. 34 miles below, the river level was 8,730 feet, giving a drop of 28 feet to the mile. At Pima Cochung, the altitude was 8380 feet, and the drop 24 feet a mile. Three miles farther down, the altitude was 8,090, giving a drop of 97 feet a mile, which included the 30-feet drop of Kintroup's fall. At the lowest point Captain Bailey reached in the riverbed, the altitude was 7,480 feet, giving a drop of 48 feet to the mile. The next point on the river which they had visited was Lagung below the gorges, where they could not take an observation in the riverbed,

but 45 miles downstream the altitude was 2,610 feet. There remained, therefore, some 50 miles of gorge which had not been and could not be explored, and the information about it was only indirect. From Lagung, upstream to where the Po-Tzang Po joined the Tsangpo, lay a stretch which many natives had visited. The altitude of the junction was estimated at 5,700 feet, which would give a drop of 3,090 feet in the 75 miles down to their observation of 2,610 feet, a fall of some 41 feet per mile. Here there was clearly no waterfall. From the junction of the two streams to the point where Captain Bailey turned back was not more than 20 miles and the drop 1,780 feet, giving a fall of 89 feet a

mile. The Monbo's whom he had met told him that they had hunted on the right bank of the stream throughout this unknown stretch, and that, though there were many rapids, there were no big cascades, We are not concerned with the rest of the journey of Captain Bailey and Captain Moorshead, which took them upstream to Tsitang, where Nain Singh had gone in 1874 and back to India by the wild country of the Bhutan border. Their evidence may be considered to have finally solved the riddle of how the Great River breaks through the highest range on the globe. It does it by means of hundreds of miles of marvelous gorges, where the stream foams in rapids, but there is no fall more considerable than can be found in many a Scottish salmon river.

I am not sure that the reality is not more impressive than the romantic expectation. The mighty current is not tossed in spray over great cliffs, but during the eons it has bitten a deep trough through that formidable rock wall. Curiously enough, the rivers which break through the Himalaya chose the highest parts of the reins through which to cut. South of Pima Cochung is the great peak of Namchabarwa, 25,445 feet high. North of it is the peak of Giala Piri, 23,460 feet. The distance between these mountains is only some 14 miles,

and through this gap, at an altitude of just under 9,000 feet, flows the great river. End of Chapter 2 Chapter 3, Part 1 of the Last Secrets by John Buckin. This Libra Box recording is in the public domain. Chapter 3, the North Pole, Part 1 When skeptical people say that polar exploration has been of no benefit to mankind, it is permissible to think that their judgment is as unsound as their point of view is limited. Not only have polar explorers added enormously to the scientific knowledge of the world,

but they have also materially aided commerce. But even if these voyages had been barren of scientific and commercial results, they would have been infinitely worth making. For among polar explorers are many men who must be universally regarded as heroes. No training was more rigorous and dangerous. No work has ever called for more endurance, resource, and courage. A nation which is without its heroes is in a sad plight. A nation which has them and ignores their example can only be looked upon with pity.

The spirit of high adventure is one that no country can afford to neglect. The history of geographical discovery is, in its initial stages, almost solely one of conquest. men, either for their own or their country's profit, and sometimes for both, went out in search of unknown lands because they wanted to trade with them. Pithias, who has been described as one of the most intrepid explorers the world has ever seen, was the first man to bring news of the Arctic regions to the civilized world. He did not pretend to have visited them, but in or about 3.30 BC, he set out from Marseilles and journeyed north. During this voyage, which must have lasted for several years, he visited Britain and then, proceeding to the most northerly point of the British Isles,

he heard of an Arctic land called Thule, which at one time of the year enjoyed perpetual day and at another had to endure perpetual night. With a leap over a few hundred years, we come to Ptolemy, whose influence on geography was almost paramount from the second century to comparatively modern times. No one is more dangerous than a bad cartographer or more valuable than a good one, but although Ptolemy made many mistakes, he also did such splendid work that it is quite easy to forget them. To him, we owe the names of latitude and longitude, and it has been well said of him that he held the extraordinary distinction of being the greatest authority on astronomy and geography for over 1,500 years. Ptolemy's work may have required to be corrected and amplified, but at least he gave

the world something which was worthy of correction. In the 8th and 9th centuries, Norsemen became terrors in Europe. Herald of the Fair Hair reigned from 860 to 930 AD, and these 70 years formed a period of great adventure. During Herald's reign, the Norsemen colonized Iceland, and in 983, Eric the Red founded a colony in Greenland, which flourished until the Norwegians ceased to take an interest in it. Not until the 15th century did English seamen begin to turn their attention to the north. They were more or less forced to do so. Portugal and Spain were all powerful in the east and west, and so England began earnestly to think of discovering a way to Cathay and the Spice Islands by a northern route. But if we were a little slow and beginning to pay attention to the Arctic regions,

we have every cause to be satisfied with our work after we had once begun it. The 15th century saw considerable activity as regards Scandinavia, but it was not until 1505 that a charter was granted to the company of merchant adventurers, and from that year, we can date our real interest in Arctic discovery. It is well, perhaps, to bear in mind, while thinking of polar exploration, that there is a marked difference between the two polar regions. The Arctic is an ocean surrounded by continental lands. The Antarctic is a continental land surrounded by oceans. In 1553, Sir Hugh Willoughby set out to try and find a north-eastern part of the north of the passage to the Indies. On this voyage, in which Willoughby lost his life, Novia Zemla was discovered,

and Richard Chancellor, who took part in the expedition, reached Archangel, and then traveling overland to Moscow was received graciously by Ivan the Terrible, the Tsar of Russia. This visit was of importance because it helped to establish trade between England and Russia. Competition to find a route northwards to China and the Indies had by this time become acute in Europe, and many bold navigators set out from England. Among the sailors who were maintaining her high record on the seas, Sir Martin Frobyshire deserves especially to be mentioned. In 1576, he set out, cheered doubtless by knowing that Queen Elizabeth had a good liking of their doings, to find a northwest passage. On three occasions, Frubbyshire voyaged northwards, and he reached Greenland

and discovered the strait that was named after him. He is not worthy, Sir Humphrey Gilbert wrote in the latter part of the 16th century, to live at all who, for fear of danger or death, shunneth his country's service or his own honor, since death is inevitable and the fame of virtue immortal. Most assuredly, our Elizabethan sailors did not shun their country's service, and Elizabeth herself was the first to appreciate and encourage their enterprise. In 1585, yet another distinguished explorer, John Davis, embarked upon his career and during his voyages, he made discoveries that converted the Arctic region from a confused myth into a defined area. He found several passages toward the west, and thus strengthened the hope of finding a northwest passage, and he also reached the farthest north, 72 degrees 12 minutes north, some 1,100 miles from the geographical North Pole. As yet, no one had turned his thoughts to the North Pole itself, but it may truly be said that Davis and men of his caliber

were already beginning to prepare the way for the time when it would be reached. For his discoveries, like those of many of the earlier explorers, were both important in themselves, and also act as a guide and incentive to those who followed. In the meantime, Davis had obtained the record for the farthest north, a record which Great Britain, with the exception of a very few years, continued to hold until 1882. Many English navigators did great work in maintaining this record,

and among them was Henry Hudson, who set out in 1607 with the object of finding a northwest passage to the Indies. Hudson, in this voyage, reached 80 degrees north, and did most valuable work in the Spitsbergen quadrant. It is also reported that two of his men saw a mermaid, which may at least be taken as evidence that they were more than ordinarily observant. Both geographically and commercially,

Hudson's voyages were of the first importance. He not only made many discoveries, including that to the river which bears his name, but he also brought back the news that led directly to the establishment of the Spitzbergen whale fishery, an industry that was extremely lucrative to Holland. In 1615, William Baffin discovered the land that is called after him, and then, for some time, English discovery in the Arctic regions ceased to be noteworthy. Maffin made no less than five voyages to the north, and, scientifically, his observations were permanently valuable to subsequent explorers. Apart from geographical discovery,

these Arctic voyages had so far been a great stimulant trade. In Greenland, Davis Strait, and the Spitzburg in seas, trade had followed discovery, and what had happened in those parts of the Arctic also took place in Hudson's Bay after the Hudson's Bay Company was formed in 1668. In fact, for the time being, the desire to make geographical discoveries was almost obliterated by the desire to trade. It is, however, pleasant to note that during the 18th century, some of our governments took an intelligent interest in the geographical discovery. They offered a reward of 5,000 pounds for reaching 89 degrees north, and 20,000 pounds was offered to anyone who could find the Northwest Passage.

In the earlier part of the 18th century, the part that the Russians took an Arctic discovery must not be omitted. In 1728, Peter the Great sent out an expedition under the command of Vitis Bering, a Dane, in which Bering Strait and other discoveries were made. and although it is impossible to mention them in detail, the contributions that the Russians made in revealing the new world to the old were most creditable to them as a nation.

In 1773, Captain Phipps conducted an expedition, which now derives its chief interest from the fact that Horatio Nelson, then a young midshipman, took part in it. Great, says Sir Clement Smarkham, as are the commercial advantages obtained from Arctic discovery, and still greater as are its scientific results, the most important of all are its uses as a nursery for our seamen, as a school for our future Nelson's, and as affording the best opportunities for distinction to young naval officers in time of peace. And it is incontestably true that many of our finest sailors have learnt their

trade in the severe school of the geographical exploration. With the advent of the 19th century, many expeditions were set to the far north. The desire, actually to reach the North Pole itself did not enter the thoughts of these courageous navigators, the main object of their voyage is being either to find the northwest passage around North America to the Indies or the northeast passage around Asia. Nevertheless, each one of these voyages added to the store of knowledge that was being accumulated. Each expedition solved some of the mysteries of the North and prepared the way for the solution of what came to be considered the greatest mystery of all. In 1819, Sir Edward Perry embarked upon the first of the Arctic voyages,

which have made his name famous in the annals of exploration. A sailor by profession, Perry was happy and possessing the qualities that fitted him to lead men. During his first expedition, the prize offered by the English government to the first navigator who passed the 110th Meridian was won. Perry and his party spent a winter in the Arctic, a winter which, thanks to their leader's careful preparations, was passed without mishap.

And then, when the winter was over, an expedition to explore the interior of Melville Island was made. Thus, Arctic traveling was inaugurated by Perry. Other successful voyages under the same leadership followed, and when in 1827 our Admiralty began favorably to consider the idea of getting as near as possible to the pole by way of Spitzbergen, Perry was naturally chosen to command the expedition. So, for the fourth time, Perry sailed northwards, and having reached the north coast of Spitzburg, Bergen, he found a good harbor for his ship, the Hecla, and left her there.

The explorers had taken specially fitted boats with them, and these they hoped to be able to haul over the ice. The summer, however, had begun to break up the flows, and in consequence the travelers had constantly to take the steel runners off the boats so that stretches of open water could be crossed. Moreover, the flows they did find seemed to resent such treatment, for most of them were small and bestrooned with most obstructive hummocks. Not until they had been pulling and hauling for nearly a month did they meet with large flows, and by that time, the southerly drifted the ice was in full swing.

However hard Perry and his men pulled, they found that the drift was as strong as they were or stronger. After terrific labor, Perry reached 82 degrees, 45 minutes, a higher latitude than any reach during the next 50 years. It was a great attempt by a man whose devotion to his duty is beyond all praise. Before we come to the most tragic story in the history of Arctic exploration, reference must be made to the discoveries of Captain John Ross. In his first expedition to the north, Captain Ross was not successful,

but in his second voyage when he was accompanied by his nephew, James St. Sea Ross, who afterwards gained distinction in the Antarctic, the magnetic North Pole was discovered and the British flag fixed there in 70 degrees 5 minutes 17 seconds north and 76 degrees 16 minutes, 4 seconds west. Ross's expedition spent four consecutive winters in the far north, discovered over 200 miles of coastline, and returned with a bountiful crop of scientific knowledge. we may well admire the love of adventure and the desire to make geographical and scientific discoveries which induce these constant expeditions to parts of the world that cannot possibly be called inviting honor was and is due to the man who undertook them but to john franklin's memory a special honor is paid

for his name is connected with both heroism and tragedy as a boy franklin and spite of his father's opposition, determined to be a sailor. At the age of 14, he was in the polyphemus at the Battle of Copenhagen, and subsequently he was present at the Battle of Trafalgar. Peace, then, as always, brought unemployment for sailors with it, and at the age of 29, Franklin found himself unwanted in the Navy. When, however, the Admiralty decided in 1818 to send expeditions to find the North Pole and the Northwest Passage, Franklin was chosen to command the Trent. This ship was totally unsuited for such task, and owing to official economy, not to say parsimony, Franklin had to return without achieving any success. In the following year, he was again sent out with orders to explore the northern coast of

arctic America, and the trending of that coast from the mouth of the copper mine eastwards. Not until 1822 did this expedition of discovery come to a close after 5,550 miles had been covered by water and land. The tale of its adventures, extraordinary as they were, is only the preface to Franklin's life as an explorer. So famous indeed was he that when in 1844, he returned from. He returned from Tasmania, where he had been governor for seven years, he was offered the command of an important Arctic expedition. At this time, he was nearly 60 years old, but he was anxious to resume his exploratory work,

and in 1845 he sailed with the Arabis and the Terror, ships that had already won their laurels under Sir James Ross in the Antarctic. In the hope of finding the Northwest Passage, so much coveted and so long concealed, Franklin was instructed to try a route by Wellington Channel if ice did not block the way. The channel was found to be clear, and the explorers made their way up it

until they reached 77 degrees north. Then their advance was blocked by ice, and they turned south, and found winter quarters off Beechy Island. All so far had gone well, and when the ships were released from the ice at the end of the winter, hopes for further successes. must have run high. But presently a mistake was made that had fatal results, a mistake due to an

error of the chartmakers. For some time the ships sailed gaily on, important discoveries being made from day to day. Then came the fatal decision. All was open to the south. If they had continued on their southerly course, the two ships would have reached the bearing straight. There was the navigable passage before them. But, alas, the chartmakers had drawn an isthmus, which only existed in their imagination, connecting Boothia with King Williamland. So they altered their course to the west, and were lost. Soon the ships were surrounded by a dense ice pack, and were dangerously imprisoned. In the spring of 1847, traveling parties were sent out, and one of them, under Graham Gore's command, discovered a Northwest Passage, and consequently proved the connection between the Atlantic and the Pacific Ocean.

When the parties returned, Franklin was seriously ill, and he died on the 11th of June 1847. No more beautiful epitaph has ever been written than the one in Westminster Abbey, which Tennyson wrote in honor of John Franklin, his uncle-in-law. Not here, the cold north hath thy be. bones and thou heroic sailor soul are passing on their happier voyage now towards no earthly pole. A terrible winter for this gallant band of explorers followed. For months and months the ice remained impenetrable, and at last the ships had to be abandoned. Even if the Erebus and the terror could have been freed from the ice, it was more than doubtful if they would float, so battered were they

by their long, slow drift. Food was both inadequate in quantity and poisonous in quality. Twenty-two officers and men died during that winter of horror. The rest were so weak from privations that, although they knew their only chance was to retreat by Bax Fish River, none of them had the strength successfully to undertake such a march. It is useless to dwell over the sufferings of these heroic men. Captain Crozier and Captain Fitzjames took every precaution and made all preparations that were under the circumstances possible,

but the dice were too heavily loaded against them. With their two heavy boat sledges, they started on the 22nd of April 1848 to make their desperate effort. Not one of them survived. The Erebus sank when the ice released her. The terror also sank, but not until she had drifted on to the American. American coast and been plundered by Eskimos. It is pitiable to think that prompt action from England might have saved some, at least, of these valuable lives. But at first, although there was considerable anxiety about their fate, no effort was made to find them. Not until 1848 were expeditions sent out in search of Franklin's party, and neither of these was successful in finding any traces. One of these expeditions was, however, noteworthy, for Leopold McClintock, who subsequently became so renowned as a sledge traveler, took part in it. By 1850, the whole country had become

thoroughly aroused, and the government decided to send out strongly equipped expeditions. The Enterprise and the Investigator, under Captains Collinson and McClure, were sent out to search by way of Bering Strait, and four ships under Captain Austin, were to seek for traces of the missing party by way of Lancaster Sound. Austin's expedition failed to find the missing men, but it was excellently conducted and organized, and its sledge travelers, among whom was McClintock, covered over 7,000 miles and discovered more than 1,200 miles of new land. When Captain Austin returned to England, nothing had been heard of the Enterprise and the

investigator, and after some discussion and consequent delay, it was resolved again to send the four ships to the Arctic. Not only Franklin's men, but also the enterprise and the investigator had now to be searched for. It was a case of search parties looking for search parties. In their main object, that of clearing up the mystery of Franklin and his companions, these expeditions were not successful, but in other ways they more than justified themselves. Both Collinson in the Enterprise and McClure and the investigator succeeded in finding a Northwest Passage, and much-needed help was brought to McClure by the expedition sent out partly for the purpose of aiding him and Collinson.

Further, the sledge journeys of McClintock and Meacham during these expeditions were unrivaled in result and a real triumph of organization. Owing to the outbreak the Crimean War in 1854, popular interest in the fate of the Franklin expedition diminished, but Lady Franklin remained loyal to the object to which so many years of her life had been dedicated. And after the government had refused to assist her further, she decided to fit out a private expedition, of which Captain McClintock took command. In June 1857, the fox, a steam yacht of 177 tons, started on her voyage to Greenland, but on reaching Melville Sound, McClintick found it extraordinarily packed with ice.

The little vessel was firmly imprisoned and had to spend the winter in the drifting pack. During eight months, she drifted southward for nearly 1,200 geographical miles, and she was not liberated from her prison until April 1858. After such an experience, many leaders would have made for a port in which to refit, but McClintock was of a different temper. No sooner had the fox freed herself from her perilous position, then he turned her head towards the north, and once more took up the work that he had been sent out to do.

And this determination to concentrate at all costs on the definite object in hand ultimately met with its sad reward. In June 1859, it was proved beyond any doubt that the report of the Eskimos, which had been received in England in 1854, to the effect that they had seen the dead bodies

of several of Franklin's men, was true. All the coastline along which the retreating crews performed their fearful march must, McClintock wrote, be sacred to their names alone. Among the many feats that McClintock and his men performed during this last search were a march round King William Island, the discovery of the one navigable northwest passage, and the discovery of some 800 miles of new coastline.

As far as geographical discovery was concerned, the main result of the many expeditions sent out in search of Franklin was that the islands to the north of North America had been mapped out. In 1853, an American expedition, under Elisha Cain, which was sent out in search of Franklin to the north of Smith Sound, was fruitful in geographical discovery, and outlined what had been called the American Route to the Pole. Interest in the Smith's Sound Route began to grow in England and was stimulated by another American expedition, led by Charles Hall in 1871. But although the desire to undertake more Arctic

research was strongly felt by many Englishmen, it cannot be said that it was encouraged in official circles. In 1872, Mr. Lowe and Mr. Goshen did receive a deputation of Arctic enthusiasts, but were by no means encouraging in their replies. An expedition, however, under Commander Albert Markham sent out in 1873 and succeeded in capturing 28 whales, which were worth nearly 19,000 pounds, and the result of this voyage was to stimulate the idea of further Arctic enterprise. In November 1874, Lord Beaconsfield, who was at the time Prime Minister, announced that an Arctic expedition to encourage maritime enterprise and to explore the regions around the pole, be sent out. Sir Clements Markham and other Arctic enthusiasts in England were delighted with

this announcement, but their delight was short-lived. These enthusiasts had for years been advocating that exploratory work should be undertaken in the region around the pole, but they did not consider that a mere rush to the pole should be undertaken until, at any rate, work of more value to mankind had been done. The conduct of the projected expedition was taken over by the Admiralty, and great was the consternation of Sir Clements and his friends, when it was announced that the main object of the expedition was to attain the highest latitude, and, if possible, to reach the North Pole. However, displeasing such an object was to these enthusiasts, they could not but rejoice at the interest shown in their expedition

and in the fact that Captain Nairz was appointed to command it. At the end of May, 1875, the ship sailed from Portsmouth, and on arriving in the Arctic regions, Nairz had to bear in mind his definite instructions. In short, exploratory work was to give way to an effort to reach, if possible, the pole itself. But anxious as he was to carry out his orders,

one terrible scourge stood in his way. Scurvy, that deadly disease, attacked his party during the winter and nearly half his men suffered from it. Under such conditions, he was severely handicapped. But he decided to send out three sledge parties eastward, westward, and to the north. Lieutenant Pelham Aldrich was in charge of the Western Party,

and although most of the sledge crew were weakened by Scurvy, they marched over 600 miles and succeeded in reaching 82 degrees 48 minutes north, a few miles farther north than Perry had reached some 50 years previously. In 1882, an American expedition under Lieutenant Greeley, though terribly unfortunate in some respects, was successful in resting the record for farthest north from the British. We must turn aside for a moment from these efforts to get farther and farther north, to mention the exploits of that distinguished Swedish explorer, Adolf Eric Nordenskilde.

As early as 1873, Nordenskiel began to think that the northeast passage by the Siberian coast might, when found, proved to be of great commercial value. And after some preliminary expeditions, he in 1878 set out in of Vega on his great voyage, and in August the ship passed Cape Cheluskin, the most northerly point of the old world. By September, however, the Vega, went very near to the completion of her task, was so surrounded by ice that she could proceed no farther, and for ten months she was held a prisoner. Not until the following July was the Vega free to resume her voyage, and shortly afterwards she rounded East Cape and saluted the easternmost coast of Asia in honor of the completing of the Northeast Passage.

Nordenskiel, both as an explorer and as a man of science, has left the world greatly in his debt, and it has been well said that when he died, a vast amount of knowledge died with him. Nordenskill's name, like Fritjof Nansen's, is intimately connected with exploratory work in Greenland. nansen was born in eighteen sixty one and he was only twenty-seven years of age when his devotion to discovery led him to make an expedition on lines that were as courageous as they were original up to this date eighteen eighty eight the recognized method employed in polar exploratory work had been to establish a base where stores were placed and from this base to march as far as possible in various directions

But when Nansen determined to cross Greenland from east to west, he paid no attention to recognized methods. With five companions, he in June 1888 was taken in adjacent to the ice's edge on the east coast of Greenland, and there the explorers, hoping shortly to reach land, took to their boats. Some time, however, passed before they could make a landing, but eventually a suitable place was found, and then they began their great march. With no base to which they could return, the party had literally taken their lives into their hands, for failure almost certainly meant death.

Starting on the 22nd of August, the party, four days later, had mounted to a height of 6,000 feet, and by the middle of September had reached the summit, 8,250 feet. Eventually, the explorers managed, to reach the Danish settlement at Godthab, and in the following year returned to Norway. It was a fine effort, fruitful alike in geographical discovery and in meteorological results, and famous as Nansen's name subsequently and deservedly became, by no means his least claim

to the honor is derived from this great march across Greenland. Between 1892 and 1895, the American Lieutenant Piri, using dogs for purposes of traction, made two successful marches across Greenland and so prepared himself for the attacks on the North Pole itself, attacks which he was ultimately to bring to a successful conclusion. The date 1893 will always be renowned in the history of Arctic exploration, for during that year, Nansen embarked upon his remarkable voyage and is no less remarkable ship, the Fram. From careful observations and investigations, Nansen was convinced that there was a continuous drift of ice from the northeast shore of Siberia across the Arctic ocean. Hitherto, Arctic explorers had struggled hard to avoid being beset by ice. Far from following in their

wake, it was Nansen's plan to get his vessel frozen in the pack and then to drift toward the pole. it would be untruthful to say that his plan was encouraged by the majority of arctic experts but nansen was not the man to be dissuaded from any project which after consideration he had taken in hand For such a voyage, an especially constructed ship was necessary, and so Mr. Colin Archer was instructed to build a vessel specially designed to resist ice pressure. The main object of Nansen and Archer was that she should slip like an eel out of the embraces of the ice. Nansen calculated that the drift would take about three years, and he provisioned the Fram for five years. On this historic voyage, Nansen was accompanied by 12 other adventurous men. Sailing from Norway in July, 1893, the carousie was crossed, and early in September, Cape Chiluskin was

rounded. About a fortnight later, the ship was frozen in, and the great drift began. During the next months, the fram was given ample opportunity to prove her worth, and she seized it nobly. In October, great pressure from the ice was experienced, but both then and later the ship resisted and rose to the pressure. During her first year in the ice, the Fram drifted a distance of 189 miles. During the second winter, Nansen taking Frederick Johansson with him and leaving Otto's fair drop in charge of the ship, decided to leave the Fram and try to reach the pole. A start was made in March 1895, and in less than a month, 86 degrees, 28 minutes north was reached. At that point, the explorers had to turn south, and after many perilous adventures,

they landed at the end of August on an island of the Franz Joseph Group. There they decided to winter, and there they had to remain for nine long months. When at last they were able to proceed a grave disaster was only prevented by Nansen's promptitude and courage. The explorers were on shore when Johnson noticed that their kayaks, Eskimo canoes of light wooden framework covered with sealskins, were adrift. The loss of these boats could scarcely have meant less than death to the explorers, and Nansen immediately jumped into the icy water and swam to retrieve them. It was an action as prompt as it was her.

heroic, and it saved the situation. But Nansen's condition, when he brought back the kayaks to land, has been described as more dead than alive, and some time passed before he fully recovered from the results of his effort. Some weeks later, the kayaks were once more made as seaworthy as was possible under the circumstances, and Nansen and Johansson were again embarking on their adventurous voyage, when, by good fortune, they were frowned by Frederick Jackson, the leader of the Jackson-Harmesworth expedition, which did such good work in France-Josephland. This meeting between Nansen and Jackson has been compared

with a famous one between Livingstone and Stanley, and even if the latter was the more dramatic, the former was as opportune, for there is no gain saying that Nansen and his companion were in a most perilous position. in the meantime the drift of the fram under sferdrub's able leadership continued and she did not return to norway until august eighteen ninety six the results of the fram expedition were exceptionally important they threw sir clements markham wrote new light on the whole arctic problem nansen lifted the veil and his expedition was the most important in modern times It was discovered that there was a deep sea ocean to the north of Spitzbergen at France-Josephland,

extending beyond the pole. In 1897, a meeting was held in the Albert Hall in honor of Nansen, whose work, both geographically and scientifically, more than deserved the great welcome given to him in England. In an introduction to his, in the northern mists, Arctic exploration, in early times, Nansen quotes words from the Old North Chronicle, the king's mirror, that are curiously illuminating. Quote, If you wish to know what men seek in this land, the Arctic regions,

or why men journey thither in so great danger of their lives, it is the threefold nature of man that draws him thither. One part of him is emulation and desire of fame, for it is man's nature to go where there is a likelihood, of great danger, and to make himself famous thereby. Another part is the desire of knowledge, for it is man's nature to wish to know and see those parts of which he has heard, and to find out whether they are as it was told him or not. The third part is the desire of gain, seeing that men seek after riches in every place

where they learn that profit is to be had, even though there is great danger in it. and indeed it may well be admitted that the factors which have helped to make the modern world are mainly a desire for fame a desire for knowledge and a desire for riches and woe betide the nation that forgets the first and second of these factors and loses its soul in concentration upon the last of them end of chapter three part one chapter three part two of the last of the last of them Last Secrets by John Buckin. This Libravox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 3, The North Pole Part 2. During the years succeeding Nansen's expedition, the desire to reach the North Pole itself took possession of the minds of many brave men. Bit by bit, the Arctic regions had been mapped out. Gradually, the obstacles that maintained the pole and its splendid isolation were being overcome. Some years were to pass before its mysteries were unveiled, but in those years

there was an almost continuous effort to probe those mysteries. Nansen had discovered beyond any doubt that the pole lay in an ice-covered sea, an inhospitable place enough, but this fact did not prevent explorers from wanting to actually locate it, and in 1900 the Duke of the Abruzzi tried to reach it by way of Franz Josephland. Owing to a frost-bitten hand, the Duke could not take part in the main journey of his expedition, and so Captain Cagney commanded it. The pole withstood this effort, but Cagney did succeed in reaching 86 degrees 33 minutes north, and thus beat Nansen's record for farthest north. Previous to the Abruzzi expedition, Robert Piri had launched his first great upon the pole. This expedition lasted for four years, 1898 to 1902, but Peary encountered such

dense packs of ice which blocked his way to the polar ocean that he failed in his main object. Another attempt followed in 1906, and although this was not crowned with complete success, Perry made a world's record for farthest north by reaching 87 degrees six minutes. In this expedition he nearly lost his life, but he returned to America with a grim determination to make yet another attempt. Experience had been bought by Perry in abundance and at a great cost, and to this was added an energy that was remarkable even among polar explorers. This third voyage to the polar regions had in the nature of things to be his last. He was, when he set out upon it, 53 years of age, and although after spending over 20 years in Arctic work, he had an experience that was invaluable, even experience cannot make an Arctic explorer forget that youth is also a great asset in the polar regions.

In May 1908, Perry published his program, the main features of which are worthy of record. he decided to use the same ship, the Roosevelt, which had taken him to the north in his 1906 expedition. His route was to be by way of Smith's sound. His winter quarters were to be at Cape Sheridan, or even nearer to the pole if the ship could proceed farther. He intended to use sledges and Eskimo dogs for traction. And lastly, he placed his confidence in Eskimos, the Arctic Highlanders, as the rank and file of his sledge parties. Most careful preparations were made for this expedition, and while Piri was making them,

he received much practical support, but also some suggestions that were not notably helpful. For instance, one cheerful crank invited him to become a human cannonball. Some sort of machine was to be taken to the north, and then, when it was pointed towards the pole, the inventor assured Piri that it would shoot him there in no time. The explorer did not see his way to accepting such an abrupt means of transit. When the Roosevelt sailed on 17th July, 1908, she had 22 men on board, including Piri himself,

Robert Bartlett, Master the Roosevelt, George Wardwell, Dr. Goodsell, Professor Marvin, Donald McMillan, George Borup, and Matthew Henson, Perry's Negro Assistant, who had accompanied him on many expeditions. When Perry's vast knowledge of the polar regions is remembered, his remarks on the essentials required in an Arctic sledge journey must admittedly be valuable. The essentials and only the essentials, he writes, needed in a serious Arctic sled journey, no matter what the season, the temperature, or the duration of the journey, whether one month or six, are four. Pemmican, tea, ships, biscuit, condensed milk. And it is interesting to note that of these commodities, he took 50,000 pounds of pemmican, 10,000 pounds of biscuit, 800 pounds of

tea, and 100 cases of condensed milk on this expedition. The Roosevelt reached Cape York, Greenland, on the 1st of August, and there she said a temporary goodbye to the civilized world. There also, Perry met with Eskimos, whose friendship he had gained by many in continuous acts of kindness. The Eskimos are, within their limits, a lovable and loyal people. Their good qualities are those of nice children, their bad qualities, those of mischievous children. I have made it a point, Perry says, to be firm with them, but to rule them. by love and gratitude rather than by fear and threats. An Eskimo, like an Indian, never forgets a broken promise, nor a fulfilled one.

These Eskimos live on the verge of starvation for many months in the year, but if they are not troubled by questions of morality in one sense of the word, they are at any rate ready to share what they have got in the way of food or means to have plain it with those who are less fortunate than themselves. Religion, as we understand it, does not enter into their scheme of things, but they pay studious attention to spirits, especially to Tornarsuk, who is the devil himself, and consequently leader of all evil spirits. One can appreciate the child-likeness of people who will rip an old garment to shreds so that the devil may be prevented from wearing it. After leaving Cape York, Piri transferred himself for some days to the Eric, his auxiliary supply steamer,

so that he could collect as many Eskimos and dogs as he required. By the 11th of August, the Eric reached Etta and joined the Roosevelt. Finally, Piri selected 49 Eskimos and 246 dogs, and having transferred them to the Roosevelt, the explorers set out to fight their way through Thurichael. 350 miles of ice-blocked water that separated Etta from Cape Sheridan. And the ice during that journey was in no gentle mood, so great were the risks that the ship might at any time be crushed that the boats fully equipped and provisioned were always ready to be lowered at a moment's notice. A terrific battle with that uncompromising opponent

the ice followed, but not until 30th August did the struggle to reach. its climax. On that day, the ship was kicked about by flows as if she had been a football, and the pressure was so terrific that Piri decided to dynamite the ice. This operation was successful in relieving the situation, but some days passed before even the greatest optimist in the ship could consider her free from danger. But on the 5th of September, the Roosevelt managed to fight her way through to Cape Sheridan, and after a project to take her on to Porter Bay had been abandoned, the work of unloading her was begun, and with her lighter load, Captain Bartlett proceeded to get her as near the shore as possible. The first stage on the way to the pole was

behind the explorers, and if the next stage was shorter in distance, it was no less important a part of the whole scheme. The second stage consisted of the transportation of supplies from Cape Sheridan to Cape Columbia, 90 miles northwest of the ship. Cape Columbia is the most northerly point of Grandland, and from there, Piri had determined to make his dash over the ice to the pole. But to move an enormous quantity of supplies over such a distance was work that needed much thought and care, for in the first place, some of Perry's companions were unused to driving sledges, and secondly, neither the weather nor the track were likely to give them.

them much assistance. These sledging parties on the way to Cape Columbia were soon organized, and in addition, hunting parties were sent out, and a supply of fresh meat for the winter was obtained. Imagine us, Perry wrote, in our winter home on the Roosevelt. The ship held tight in her icy berth, 150 yards from the shore, the ship and the surrounding world covered with snow, the wind creaking in the rigging, whistling and shrieking around the corners of the deckhouses, the temperatures ranging from zero to sixty below, and the ice-back in the channel outside groaning and complaining with the movement of the tides. In these words, Puri gives us an excellent picture of the explorer's winter home,

a home upon which the sun never shone for many months, but which in spite of the darkness was a home of unceasing industry and preparation. And among the innumerable activities that took place, none was more important than the task of attending to the dogs. Early in November, Piri had become anxious about these all-important factors of his expedition. Over 50 of them were dead already, and a few days later only 160 dogs out of the 245th who had arrived were left. A change of diet from whale to walrus meat put an end to these appalling losses, but Piri's anxiety until he discovered a way to prevent the

them can be easily imagined. For without any adequate supply of dogs, he knew all too well that neither he nor anyone else would ever reach the pole. By the end of the autumn season, snow igloos had been built on the track to Cape Columbia. We have the best authority, namely Perry's, for saying that one of these snow houses can be built by four good workmen in an hour. Into this shelter, the traveler literally crawls, for the only means of interest is a hole at the bottom of one side, and when the last man of the party has got in, this opening is closed up by a block of snow already cut for the purpose. Except for one most alarming experience, when in a terrific gale the ice made a stupendous

effort against the invading ship, the winter was spent rather with anxiety about the future than with worry about the present. No wonder that Peary speculated over what awaited him when he started on his great march. After leaving Cape Columbia, over 400 miles separated him from his goal, and these miles had to be traveled over the ice of the polar sea. There is no land, he writes, between Cape Columbia and the North Pole,

and no smooth and very little level ice. But even ice through which the traveler must sometimes pickax his way is not the most serious impediment to those who would reach the pole. The great obstacle, the ever-present source of anxiety, are the leads which constantly appear. These leads are really patches of open water, varying in extent, which the winds and tides cause in the ice movement. For no reason that is apparent, these dangerous obstacles suddenly block the explorers advance, and little can be done save to wait for them to remove themselves. These leads were to be Perry's greatest impediment in his march

and were destined to be fatal to one valued member of his party. The final attack on the poll began on 15th of February, 1909, when Bartlett, with a pioneer party, left the Roosevelt, and a week later, Piri started on his way. At this time, seven members of the expedition, and 19 Eskimos, 140 dogs, and 28 sledges divided into various parties were engaged in the great effort to reach the Pole. It was arranged that all these parties should meet Perry at Cape Columbia on the last day of February. And on that day, Bartlett and Borup started from the Cape with

advanced parties. The duties of these advanced parties were as onerous as they were important, for it was to Bartlett that Perry looked for a trail by which the main party could travel. On the second day's march, after Perry had left Cape Columbia and the land behind him, he met with his first open lead and a slight delay occurred. But on the following day, his lead was covered with young ice, and Perry determined to cross it. If the reader, he wrote, will imagine crossing a river on a succession of gigantic shingles one, two or three deep, and all afloat and moving, he will perhaps form an idea of the uncertain surface over which we cross this lead. Such a passage is distinctly trying, as any moment may lose a sledge in

its team, or plunge a member of the party into the icy water. And later on, when Borup was crossing an open crack, his dogs fell into the water and the loss both of dogs and the sledge, with its invaluable load of provisions was only prevented by Borup's exceptional quickness and strength. The explorers had advanced nearly 50 miles from Cape Columbia when they were held up by a big lead, which refused most obstinately to cover itself with ice strong enough to bear the sledges.

For a week, this open water delayed the expedition, and Piri had good reason to wonder if this most careful preparation and organization were once more to miss, the success that they deserved. On 11th of March, however, the parties managed to cross the lead, and on the march that followed, they crossed the 84th parallel. When the explorers started on this journey, Piri did not announce how far each one of his companions was to accompany him on the march, and presently Dr. Goodsell and McMillan, with Eskimos, sledges, and dogs turned back. Then the main expedition consisted of 16 men, 12 sledges, and 100 dogs.

On March 19th, Perry revealed the program he intended to follow to Bartlett, Marvin Borup, and Henson. First of all, Borup was to turn back. Five marches farther on, Marvin was to go, and after another five marches, Bartlett was to leave the polar party, which would then consist of six men, 40 dogs, and five sledges. Unlike most programs, this one of Piri's was faithfully carried out. Borup returned when 85 degrees 23 minutes was reached,

and during the next days the explorers advanced so rapidly that they succeeded in passing both Nansansans and the Duke of the Abruzzi's record for farthest north. In turn, first Bartlett and then Marvin started upon the homeward track, and Perry was left with four Eskimos, Anguah, Siglu, Otar, and Okuea, Hansen, five sledges, and forty dogs. Of these Eskimos, Oquaya was the only one who had not been in any previous expedition. But all the same, he was the most romantic of the party, because he was intent upon winning the rewards that would enable him to marry the girl of his choice.

Glimbering before his eyes, Oquia saw a whaleboat, a rifle, and other prizes which Perry had promised to those who went with him to the farthest point. Not for a moment was there any doubt about Aquia's keenness, for he was spurred on by two of the greatest incentives that any young man can have, a desire to be wealthy, and a desire to marry. Left alone with Henson and the Eskimos, Perry still had 133 nautical miles to travel before he reached his goal. This distance he intended to cover,

and five marches, and provided that the Gales would leave him in peace and not open the leads of water, he had every hope of carrying out his intention. Up to this stage in the march, Piri had been Whipper-in, but in the last stages he led the van, and during the concluding stages, it must be admitted that fortune smiled upon the travelers. True that in this almost breathless rush for the pole, leads were not entirely absolutely absent, but such as were encountered did not seriously delay the marches. As, however,

Piri got nearer and nearer to the pole, the fear that the prize might at the last moment be snatched away from him by an impassable lead was constantly with him. On the 5th of April, the Pardy reached 89 degrees, 25 minutes north, and were within 35 miles of the

pole. So near indeed were they that Piri writes, By some strange shift of feeling, the fear the leads had fallen from me completely. I now felt that success was certain. And his confidence was justified. On April 6, 1909, Ferry, with his colored assistant Matthew Henson and the four Eskimos reached the pole, and there the leader of this successful party wrote the following note.

90 degrees north latitude, North Pole 6th April 1909. I have today hoisted the national ensign of the United States of America at this place, which my observations indicate to be the North Pole axis of the earth, and have formally taken possession of the entire region and adjacent for and in the name of the President of the United States of America. I leave this record and United States flag in possession. Robert E. Piri, United States Navy The explorers spent 30 hours at the pole

and then started upon the long journey back to the coast of Grantland. By the 23rd of April, favored by beautiful weather, the party had reached Cape Columbia. So favored indeed had they been that Utah remarked on their arrival that the devil is asleep or having trouble with his wife, or we should never have come back so easily. On that same day, Perry wrote in his diary,

I have got the North Pole out of my system after 23 years of effort, hard work, disappointments, hardships, privations, more or less suffering, and some risks. The joy of success, tremendous as it was, could not but be dimmed by the news that awaited Paris, on his return to the ship. For Marvin had lost his life on the return journey

and trying to cross some young and treacherous ice, and the loss of this gallant and able man illustrates all too sadly the some risks of which Perry wrote, risks which all explorers in greater or less measure have to run. As a conclusion to this chapter of adventure and determined effort, the words of that prince of explorers, Fritjof Nansen, seemed peculiar. peculiarly appropriate. From first to last, he wrote, the history of polar exploration is a single

mighty manifestation of the power of the unknown over the mind of man. End of Chapter 3. Chapter 4 of The Last Secrets by John Buckin. This Librevox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 4, the Mountains of the Moon. Twenty-four centuries ago, a line of Estilus, Egypt nurtured by the snow, embodied a geographical theory which descended from heaven-nows-what early folk-wandering. Aristotle, with his mountain of silver, from which the Nile flowed, continued the tradition in literature. Meantime, Sabaean Arabs trading along the east coast of Africa and making expeditions to the interior, came back with stories of great inland seas and snow mountains near them. What they saw may have been only Kilimanjaro and Kenya, but the popular

acceptance of their reports points to the earlier tale linking the snows with the Nile Valley. Greek and Roman travelers spread the rumor, and presently it's found its way, probably through marines attire, into the pages of the geographer Ptolemy. Ptolemy had no doubt about these snows. He called them the mountains of the moon, and definitely fixed them as the source of the river of Egypt. For centuries after him, the question slumbered and men were too busy with creeds and conquest to think much of that font of the Nile which Alexander the Great saw in his dreams. When the exploration of Equatoria began in the last century, the story revived and the discovery of Kenya and Kilimanjaro seemed to have settled the matter. It was true that these mountains were

a long way from the Nile watershed, but then Ptolemy had never enjoyed much of a reputation for accuracy. Still, doubt remained in some minds, and explorers kept their eyes open for snow mountains which should actually feed the Nile, since, after all, so ancient a tradition had probably some ground of fact. Speak in 1861 thought he had discovered them in the chain of volcanoes between Lake Kaibu and Lake Albert Edward, but these mountains held no snow. He received a hint, however, which might have led to success, for he heard from the Arabs of Unyam Wizi of a strange mountain west of Leek Victoria, seldom visible, covered with white stuff, and so high and steep that no man could ascend it. In 1864, Sir Samuel Baker was within sight of Ruinzori

and actually saw dim shapes looming through the haze, to which he gave the name of Blue Mountains. In 1875, Stanley encamped for several days upon the eastern slopes, but he did not realize the greatness of the heights above him. He thought that they were something like Elgon, and he christened them Mount Edwin Arnold, a name happily not continued, but he had no thought of snow or glacier,

and he disbelieved the native stories of white stuff on the top. In 1876, Gordon's emissary, Jesse, recorded a strange apparition like snow mountains in the sky, which is Mensaw, but he seems to have considered it a hallucination. Stranger still, Emond Pasha lived for ten years on Lake Albert and never once saw the range, a fact which may partly be explained by his bad eyesight.

Rune Zori keeps its secret well. The mists from the Semliki Valley shrouded space, and only on the clearest days, and for a very little time, can the traveler get such a prospect as Mr. Grogan got on his famous walk from the Cape to Cairo. A purple mass. Peak piled upon peak, black streaked with forest, scored with ravine, and ever mounting till her castellated crag shoot their gleaming tops far into the violet heavens. The true discoverer was Stanley, who in 1888 suddenly had a vision of the range from the southwest shore of Lake Albert. Everyone remembers the famous passage, quote, while looking to the southeast and meditating upon the events of the last month,

my eyes were directed by a boy to a mountain said to be covered with salt, and I saw a peculiar-shaped cloud of a most beautiful silver color, which assumed the proportions and appearance of a vast mountain covered with snow. Following its form downward, I became struck with the deep blue-black color of its base and wondered if it portended another tornado. Then as the site descended to the gap between the eastern and western platees, I became, for the first time, conscious that what I gazed upon was not the image or semblance of a vast mountain,

but the solid substance of a real one, with its summit covered with snow. It now dawned upon me that this must be Ruinzori, which was said to be covered with a white metal or substance believed to be rock, as reported by Cavali's two slaves, in quote. Stanley hadn't neither the time nor the equipment for mountain expeditions, though to the end of his life, Ru and Zori remained for him a center of romance. It was his dear wish, as he told the Royal Geographical Society shortly before his death, that some lover of alpine climbing would take the range in hand and explore it from top to bottom. In 1889, one of his companions, Lieutenant St.

made an attempt from the northwest and reached a height of nearly 11,000 feet. Two years later, Dr. Stoolman, a member of Emmons' expedition, made a bold journey up the Butago Valley on the west, discovered the wonderful mountain vegetation, and nearly reached the snow level. In 1895 came Mr. Scott Elliott, who was primarily a botanist, but who, in spite of with bad malaria, managed to struggle as far as 13,000 feet. Then followed troubles in Uganda, and it was not till 1900 that the work of exploration was resumed. To make the story clear, it is necessary to explain that the range runs practically north and south, and that, at about halfway, it is cut into by two deep valleys, the Mubuku

running to the east and the Butago running to the Semliki on the west. Fort Portal at the northern end is the nearest station, and as from it the eastern side is the more accessible, it was natural that the Mobuku Valley should be chosen as the best means of access. In 1900, Mr. Moore reached its head and ascended the mountain called Kianja to the height of 14,900 feet. He had no sight of the rain, as a whole, but he believed this to be the highest peak and put the summit at about 16,000 feet. In the same year, Sir Harry Johnson followed this route. He ascended to a height of 14,828 feet on Kianja and saw from the Mobuku Valley a mountain to the north which he named Duwoni. He came to the conclusion that the highest altitude of the range was not under 20,000 feet,

and in this view he was followed by other travelers like Mr. Wilde, Mr. Grogan, and Major Gibbons, none of whom, however, actually made any a sense of the peak. The first serious mountaineering expedition was made in 1905 by Mr. Douglas Freshfield and Mr. A. L. Mum, who suffered from such appalling weather that they had to give up the attempt. Being experienced mountaineers, however, they reached some very very. valuable conclusions. From the plains, they had a clear view of the tops and ascertained that the mountain called Kianja at the head of the Mobuco Valley was certainly lower than a Twin Peak Snow Mountain beyond it to the west. They also placed the extreme height of the range at no more

than 18,000 feet. Meanwhile, Lieutenant Barron's of the Anglo-German Boundary Commission had made an elaborate triangulation and gave to the twin tops of the highest peak altitudes of 16,625 feet, and 16,549 feet, measurements let it be noted, which were only a few hundred feet out. One other expedition, which occupied the close of the same year in the beginning of 1906, deserves mention. A.F.R. Walliston of the British Museum Party, found an old ice axe in a hut probably left by Mr. Freshfield, and with a few yards of rotten rope set off with a companion to climb Keanja. He reached the height of 16,379 feet,

and also climbed a peak to the north, which he believed wrongly to be Duoni, and which now very properly bears his name. The whole performance was a brilliant adventure, and Mr. Walliston has published the story of his travels in a delightful book. Such was the position when, in April 1906, the Duke of the Abruzi and his party left Italy

to solve once and for all the riddle of the mountains. The Duke was perhaps the greatest of living mountaineers. As a rock climber, his fame has filled the Alps, and no name is more honored at Courmaier or the Monteverte. He had led polar expeditions, and he had made the first descent of the Alaskan Mount St. Ilius. His experience, therefore, had made him not only a climber, but an organizer of mountain travel. It was to this latter accomplishment that he owed his success, for Ruinzori was not so much a climbers

as a traveler's problem. The actual mountaineering is not hard, but to travel the long miles from Entebbe to the range, to cut a path through the dense jungles of the valleys, and to carry supplies and scientific apparatus to the high glacier camps required an organizing talent of the first order. The Duke left no contingency unforeseen. He took with him four celebrated Cormier guides and a staff of distinguished scientists, as well as Cav Vittoria Sella,

the greatest of living mountain photographers. So large was the expedition that 250 native porters were required to carry stores from the... in Tebby to Fort Portal. It was not a bold personal adventure like Mr. Wallaston's, but a carefully planned scientific assault upon the mystery of Ruinsori. The Duke did not only seek to ascend the highest peak,

but to climb every summit and map accurately every mountain, valley, and glacier. The story of the work has been officially written, not indeed by the leader himself who had no time to spare, but by his friend and former companions, Sir Philippo de Philippi. It is an admirable account, clear and yet picturesque, and it is illustrated by photographs and panoramas which have not often been equaled in mountaineering narratives. The term of the book is its strangeness.

It tells of a kind of mountaineering to which the world can show no parallel. When Lassa had been visited, Ruinsori remained, with the gorges of the Brahmaputra, one of the few great geographical mysteries unveiled. Happily, the unveiling has not killed the romance, for the truth is stranger than any forecast. If the mountains of the moon are lower than we had believed, they are far more wonderful.

Here you have a range almost on the equator, rising not from an upland like Kilimanjaro, but from the Albertine Depression, which is 600 or 700 feet below. the average level of Uganda, a range of which the highest peaks are 1,000 feet higher than Mont Blanc, which has draped most days of the year in mist and accessible from the plains only by deep-cut glens choked with strange trees and flowers. The altitude would in any case give every stage of climate from torrid to Arctic, but the position on the line adds something exotic,

even to the familiar mountain sites, draping a glacier moraine with a tangle of monstrous growths, and swelling the homely alpine flora into portents. The freakish spirit in nature has been let loose, and she has set snow fields and rock aritz in the heart of a giant hot house. The Duke of the Abruzzi was faced at the start with a deplorable absence of information. Even the season when the weather was most favorable was disputed. Mr. Freshfield, following Sir Harry Johnson's advice, tried November and found a perpetual shower bath. Warned by this experience, the Duke selected June and July for the attempt, and was fortunate enough to get sufficient clear days to complete his task,

though he was repeatedly driven into camp by violent rain. Another matter in doubt was the best means of approach to the highest snows. The obvious route was the Mobuco Valley, but by this time it was pretty clear that Kianja, the peak at its head, was not the highest, and it was possible that there might be no way out of the valley to the higher western summits. Still, it had been the old way of travelers, and since the alternative was the Butago Valley right on the other side of the range, the Duke chose to follow the steps of his predecessors. Just before Boutiti got his first sight of the snow and made out that a double peak, which was certainly not Johnston's Duwani, was clearly the loftiest.

Duwani came to view again in the lower Mobuku Valley, and the site, combined with the known locality of Kianja, enabled the expedition to take its bearings. Duwani was seen through the opening of a large tributary valley, the Bujuku, which entered the Mubuku on the north side between the portal peaks. Now, it had been clear from the lowlands that the highest snows were to the north of Duoni and must consequently lie between that peak in the Mubuku Valley. The conclusion was that the Bajuku must lead to the foot of the highest summits, while the Mobuku could not.

The discovery was the key to the whole geography of the range. But the Duke did not at once act upon it. He wisely decided to explore Keanja first, so thinning out his caravan and leaving his heavier stores at the last native village, he with his party pushed up the Mobuku torrent. The Mobuku Valley falls in stages from the glacier, and at the foot of each stage is a clipped face and a waterfall. The soil everywhere oozes moisture, and where an outcrop of rock or a mat of dead boughs does not give firmer going, it is needy. deep in black mud. The first stage is forestland, great conifers with masses of ferns and tree ferns below, and above a tangle of creepers and flaming orchids. At the second terrace you come to the fringe of alpine life. Here is the heath forest, of which let the narrative tell.

Quote, trunks and boughs are entirely smothered in a thick layer of mosses which hang like waving beards from every spray, cushion and englobe every knot, curl and swell around each twig, deform every outline and obliterate every feature, till the trees are mere mass of grotesque contortions, monstrous tumifactions of the discolored leprous growth. No leaf is to be seen, save on the very topmost twigs, yet the forest is dark owing to the dense network of trunks and branches. The soil disappears altogether under innumerable dead trunks, heaped one upon another in intricate piles covered with mosses viscous and slippery when exposed to the air, black, naked, and yet neither mildewed nor rotten where they have lain for years and years in deep holes. No forest can be grimmer

and stranger than this. The vegetation seems primeval of some period when forms were uncertain and provisory, end quote. But the third terrace is stranger still. There, one is out of the forest and in an alpine meadow between sheer cliffs, with far at the head the gorge of Bujongolo and the tongue of the glacier above it. But what an alpine meadow. Quote, the ground was carpeted with a deep layer of lycopium and springy moss, and thickly dotted with big clumps of the papery,

flowers, pink, yellow, and silver white of the heliocrisome and everlasting, above which rose and tall columnar stalks of lobelia like funeral torches, besides huge branching groups of the monster senesio. The impression produced was beyond words to describe. The spectacle was too weird, too improbable, too unlike all familiar images, and upon the whole brooded the same grave, deathly silence. It is a commonplace to say that in savage Africa, man is surrounded by a fauna still primeval. But in these mountains, the flora, too, is of an earlier world, that strange world which is embalmed in our coal seams. Under the veil of mist, among cliffs which lose themselves in the clouds, the traveler walks in an unearthly

landscape, with a gaunt condolabra of the Senecios, the flambos, the lobelias, and the uncanny blooms of the Helicrysa like decorations at some ghostly feast. The word Helicrysa calls up ridiculous Theocritian associations, as if the sunburnt little creeping gold of Sicily were any kin to these African marvels. Our elders were wise when they named the range the mountains of the moon, for such things might well belong to some lunar gorge of Mr. Wells' imagination. Beyond Keanja, the Duke found a little lake where a fire had raged and the senesios were charred and withered. It was a veritable valley of dry bones. Bujongolo offered the expedition a stone heap overhung by a cliff, and there the permanent

camp was fixed. Among mildews and lichens and pallid mist and an everlasting drip of rain five weeks were passed with this unpromising spot as their base. The first business was to ascend Kianja. This gave little trouble for the ridge was soon gained and an easy aright to the south led to the chief point. The height proved to be 15,988 feet, and the view from the summit settled the geography of the range and confirmed the Duke's theories. For it was now clear that the ridge at the head of the Mobuku was no part to the watershed of the chain, and that the Duwani of Johnston was to the north, not of the Mobuku, but on the Bujuku. The highest summit stood over the west, rising from the cool at the head of the Bujuku Valley.

The Duke saw that they might also be reached by making a detour to the south of Kianja, and ascending a glen, which is one of the high affluence of the Butagu, the Great Valley on the west side of the system. It may be convenient here to explain the main features of the range, giving them the new names which the expedition invented, and which are now adopted by geographers. Kianja became Mount Baker, and its highest point is called Edward Peake after the then-king of England. Due south, across the Freshfield Pass, stands Mount Luigi de Savoyah, a name given by the Royal Geographical Society and not by the Duke, who wished to christen it after Joseph Thompson, the traveler. Due north from Mount Baker, and separated from it by the upper Bujuku Valley is

Mount Speak, the Duwani of Johnston, with its main summit called Bittorio Emmanuel. West of the gap between Baker and Speak stands the highest summit of all, Mount Stanley, with its Twin Peaks, Margarita, and Alexandra. north of Mount Speak is Mount Emon, and east of the latter is Mount Jesse. Five of the great massifs cluster around the Bujuku Valley, while the sixth, Mount Luigi de Savoyah stands by itself at the south end of the chain. The assault on Mount Stanley was delayed for some days by abominable weather. At last came a clear season, and the Duke, with his guides, crossed Freshfield Pass,

and ascended the valley at the back of Mount Baker. There they spent an evening which showed what Ruinzori could be like when clouds are absent. They found a little lake, in bosomed in flowers under the cliffs, and looking to the west they saw the sun set in crimson and gold over the great spaces of the Congo forest. Next day, they reached the call which bears the name of Scott Elliott and encamped on one of the Mount Stanley Glaciers at the height of 14,817 feet. At 7.30 on the following morning, they reached the top of the first peak, Alexandra, 16,749 feet high. A short descent, and a difficult piece of step cutting through snow cornices, took them to the summit of Margarita,

16,815 feet, the highest point of the range. Quote, they emerged from the mist into splendid, clear sunlight, At their feet lay a sea of fog. An impenetrable layer of light, ashy white cloud drift, stretching as far as the eye could reach, was drifting rapidly northwestward. From the immense, moving surface emerged two fixed points,

two pure white peaks, sparkling in the sun with their myriad snow crystals. These were the two extreme summits of the highest peaks. The Duke of the Abruzi named these mountains Margarita and Alexandra in order that, under the auspices of these two royal ladies, the memory of the two nations may be handed down to posterity. Of Italy, whose name was the first to resound on these snows in a shout of victory, and of England, which in its marvelous colonial expansion

carries civilization to the slopes of these remote mountains. It was a thrilling moment when the little treacle or flag given by H.M. Queen Margarita of Savoy unfurled to the wind and sun the embroidered letters of its aspiring motto are D.C. Espera. The conquest of Mount Stanley was the culminating point of the expedition. After that, the topography being known, it only remained to ascend the four massifs of Speak, Emin, Jesse, and Luigi de Savoyah. In addition, the Bujuka Valley, with its tributary the Megusi was thoroughly explored. The aim of the Duke being completeness, many of the peaks were ascended several times to verify the observations.

There is an account of how from one peak in a sudden blink of fine weather, the leader saw two portions of the expedition in different parts of the range moving about their allotted tasks. The result of this wise organization is that today the world knows every peak, glacier, and valley in Ruin Zori, far more minutely than many habitable parts. parts of the East African Plateau. The expedition was not only a fine adventure, but a wonderful piece of solid and enduring scientific work. No Englishman will grudge that the honors of the pioneer

felt as so brilliant a climber and so unwearied a traveler as the Duke of the Abruzzi. The Italian name has always stood high in mountaineering annals, and the Duke has long ago earned his place in that inner circle of fame, which includes mummery and Guidoet, Moore and Zigsmonde. The riddle of equatorial snow has been solved, and there is nothing very startling in the answer. The upper part of the mountains has no marvels to show equal to the giant groundsholds and

lobelias and the forests of heath on the lower slopes. The glaciers are all small, without tributaries as in Norway, and there are no real basins, but merely a sort of glacier caps from which ice digitations flow down at divers points. All the same, the glacier formation is more respectable than Mr. Freshfield thought, for he saw only the small ice stream at the head of the Mobuku, and was not aware of the much greater one from Mount Stanley, which descends to the upper Bujuku valley. The limit of perpetual snow is about 14,600 feet. Mr. Freshfield was so struck by the small size of the Mubuco torrent where it issues from the glacier and by its clearness that he thought it must come from some underground spring rather than from real melting of the ice. He maintained that tropical

glaciers were consumed mainly by evaporation and only in a small degree by melting. The Dukhas, however, made it clear that the glaciers of Ruinzori are subject to the same conditions as those of the Alps and that their streams are true glacier torrents. The limpidity of the water, he ascribes to their almost complete immobility, which means that there is no grinding of the detritus in their beds. On the whole, the range offers no great scope for the energies of the mountaineer. The ice and snow work is easy, and even the huge cornices, such as are found on Margarita, are fairly safe for the climber, owing to the way in which they are propped by a forest of ice stalactites,

caused by the rapid melting of the snow. On the other hand, there is an abundance of rock climbing of every degree of difficulty, for the mountains below the snowline fall very sheer to the valleys. Luigi di Savoyah, Emin and Jesse are virtually rock peaks. An isolated summit, Mount Gagne is holy rock, and there are fine rock faces on Mount Baker and the Edward and Savoyah peaks of Mount Stanley. I doubt, however, if Ruin Zori will ever be a center for the rock gym. the weather would damp the ardor the most earnest habitue of chamonis or san martino a few hours of sunshine once a week are not enough in which to plan out roots up cliffs whose scale far exceeds the measure of the alps the grepon or the drew would have long remained virgin if their crags had been forever slimy with moisture and draped in mist and the climber had to descend to no comfortable montenbert but to a clammy tent among swamps

and mildews. And yet those peaks remain almost the strangest of the world's wonders, and their ascent will always be one of the finest of human adventures. They are mountains of the moon rather than of this common earth. The first discoverers brought back tales which were scarcely credible. Ice peaks of Himalayan magnitudes soaring out of flame-colored tropic jungles. For long, mountaineers were consumed with curiosity as to what mysteries lay behind that veil of mist. For all they knew, equatorial snow might be difficult beyond the skill of man and ruin Zori the eternal and unapproachable goal of the adventure's ambition. The truth is prosaic beside these imaginings. Any man who can afford the time and the money

who selects the right time of year, and his sound in wind and limb can stand on the dome of Margarita. But the experience will still be unique, for these mountains have no fellows on the globe. There is a certain kinship between the tail of the first ascent of Mount McKinley and Alaska, and added to the Duke of the Abruzzi. That gunt, icy peak, is as unlike the ordinary snow mountains as Rue and Zori. The climb began from the glacier at a height of a thousand feet, and 19,000 feet of snow and ice had to be surmounted. The alliance, the island. The alliance, The Alaskan giant and the mountains of the moon stand at opposite poles of climate, but both are alike in being outside the brotherhood of mountains. They are extravagances of nature, molded without regard to human needs.

For mountains, when all has been said, belong to the habitable world. There are barriers between the settlements of man, and from their isolation the climber looks to the vineyards and cornlands and cities on the plains. An ice peak near the pole and a range veiled in the steaming mists of the line are solitudes more retired and sanctuaries more inviolate. The common mountain top lifts a man above the tumult of the lowlands, but these seem to carry him beyond the tumult of the world. End of Chapter 4. Chapter 5. The Last Secrets by John Buckin.

This Librevox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 5, The South Pole, Part 1 The imaginations of bold men were captured by the idea of Arctic exploration for centuries before the Antarctic was even thought of as a feel for discovery. The Arctic regions have a history dating back to the days of King Alfred. The Antarctic can make no such boast as this, and it is true to say that attention was first drawn to the far south by the mapmakers. Much praise is due to the early mapmakers,

but as regards the far south, it must be admitted that they indulged in considerable guesswork. Ortelius, for instance, in his map of the world, which was published in Antwerp in 1570, had the temerity to draw the coast of Terra, Australas Nondum Cognita, round the world as far north in two places as the Tropic of Capricorn. Haclute did, in 1599, omit the same.

southern content from his celebrated map of the world, an abstinence on his part that deserves to be mentioned. But fictions, in spite of hacklute, continued to appear in later maps, and if they did nothing else, they were at least useful in directing the thoughts of navigators toward the Antarctic. Accident rather than design was, however, responsible for the first discoveries in the South. In 1520, Magellan found the strait, which is known by his name, and during the 16th century, what discoveries were made in the direction of the south were due to contrary winds. Owing to Gale, Sir Francis Drake in 1578, reached in latitude 56 degrees south, the uttermost part of the land towards the south pole, and so, sadly, against his will, made discoveries.

and it was owing to what has happily been called a discovery-causing gale that some Dutch ships, which had set out in 1598 for the exciting but scarcely laudable purpose of plundering the coasts of Chile and Peru, were scattered in all directions. One of these ships, a mere baby of 18 tons, was driven to 64 degrees south, and there her captain, Dirk Jarrett's, sighted highland with mountains covered with snow, like the land of Norway. If proof of the universal ignorance of the South at the beginning of the 17th century is needed, we have the expedition of Pedro Fernandez de Chiros.

Chiros was commissioned by the King of Spain, Philip III, to undertake a voyage for the purpose of annexing the South Polar Continent. And after this annexation had been completed, he was commanded to convert the inhabitants to the true faith. It was an ambitious program, and it was far, indeed from being carried out. In fact, the results of the expedition was almost comical. Kiros discovered the largest island of the New Hebrides, and in the belief that it was part of the southern continent, he not only annexed it, but also the South Pole itself to the crown of Spain.

This expedition must be considered the first Antarctic expedition, but there is no denying that its results were more ludicrous than encouraging. Little progress was made during the 17th century in adding to the world's knowledge of the south, but in one way and another, the mapmakers received severe buffets. Toward the end of that century and the beginning of the next, some ships reached 62 degrees south and 63 degrees south, and encountering great icebergs, gained knowledge that tended to disperse the idea of a huge continent

from which men could reap wealth and live in comfort while reaping it. In spite, however, of this waning belief in a fertile and populous southern continent, several voyages were undertaken to look for it. But it is to be noted that the men who made these adventurous journeys were not in the least interested in exploration for exploration's sake. The reason why they made these expeditions was mainly because they hoped to enrich themselves. Not until the latter half of the 18th century was there any change in what may be called the spirit of exploration.

And then, in 1764, the English government issued instructions to Commodore Byron, which clearly showed that the importance of discovery, for discovery's sake alone, was beginning to be realized. Science had been making progress, and the desire really to know and no longer guess at the extent to nature of the world perceptibly increased. Scientists engaged solely on scientific work accompanied both the expeditions of Marion and Curgulan, and when Captain James Cook sailed in 1772 from

Deptford on what was the first British Antarctic expedition, he was also accompanied by scientists. The name of James Cook will always be given a place of honor among explorers, for quite apart from the discoveries that he made, he set an example of courage in facing dangers and difficulties that can never be forgotten. He and all the earlier navigators, we must remember, had to undertake their voyages and ships that were totally unfit to encounter ice. And when this fact is realized, we are compelled to admire the pertinacity with which they carried out their work, and to recognize that the results of their efforts were, under the circumstances, magnificent. It is a It has been well said that James Cook defined the Antarctic region and that James Ross discovered

it. And indeed, it would be difficult to overestimate the importance either of Cook's voyages or of those subsequently undertaken by Ross. January 17, 1773 was a red-letter day in the annals of exploration, for during its forenoon, Cook crossed the Antarctic Circle for the first time. Icebergs and loose-pack ice were then surrounding him, but he pushed on until he cited closely packed ice. In his opinion, he might possibly have pushed his way through this ice, but in such a ship as the resolution, 462 tons, he did not consider himself justified in making so dangerous an experiment. The latitude that he reached was 71 degrees 10 minutes south, longitude 10.54 minutes west. Cook's expedition returned to Portsmouth in July 1775, and then the value of this voyage was recognized.

He had made the circuit of the southern ocean in a high latitude, and had forever crushed the idea of a fertile and fruitful southern continent. If land lay beyond the Antarctic Circle, Cook thought it must consist of, quote, countries condemned to everlasting rigidity by nature, never to yield to the warmth of the sun, for those, wild and desolate aspect, I find no words." In quote, Cook, in short, had revealed the limits of the habitable globe, and his accounts of what he had encountered in the far south did not encourage men who were anxious to find land in which fortunes could quickly be made

to think longingly of the Antarctic. After Cook's return, no serious attempt at geographical discoveries in the South was made until the Russian government, in 1819, sent an expedition under Captain Bellinghausen to the southern seas. Bellinghausen's ambition was to rival Cook's feet of making the circuit of the southern ocean in a high latitude, and he achieved it.

He was also the first explorer, definitely to discover land within the Antarctic Circle. Two or three years later, James Weddell, whose real business was sealing, reached the latitude of 74 degrees, 15 minutes south, more than three degrees to the south of Cook's farthest point, and for nearly 20 years, Weddell's record remained intact. During the first half of the 19th century,

the southern seas became the scene of extensive sealing industries, and however much we may regret the wholesale slaughter that took place, we have to confess that some of these sealers made important geographical discoveries. Both Captain John Biscoe and Captain John Baloney were engaged in the Antarctic sealing trade, but they were fortunate enough to be employed by the firm of Enderby. Charles Enderby instructed his captains not to neglect geographical discovery, and his instructions were faithfully carried out. To the enterprise of Enderby and to the courage and perseverance of his captains,

we owe the discovery of Gramland, Inderby Land, Kemp Island, and Sabrina. land. A French expedition under Captain De Erbil and an American one under Captain Wilkes followed in 1840. De Erbil, who encountered so many icebergs that he felt as if he was in narrow streets of a city of giants, sighted land in latitude 66 degrees south, longitude 140 degrees east, and named this coast Adelaide land. Wilkes also claimed to have discovered land, but of his claims one of our greatest explorers has written, quote, had he been more circumspect in his reports of land, all would have agreed that his voyage was a fine performance, end quote. Two or three years before Deerbable and Wilkes set out on their voyages, Colonel Sabine at a meeting of the British

Association, read a paper on the subject of terrestrial magnetism, and the result was that polar exploration received a great incentive. By this time, the importance of terrestrial magnetism, in regard to the navigation of ships was admitted, and the government was petitioned to send a naval expedition for the purpose of increasing our knowledge of this science in the South. A favorable reply was received from Lord Melbourne, and in 1839 Sir James Ross was appointed to command an expedition whose object was rather magnetic research than geographical discovery.

Two old bomb vessels, the Aribus 370 tons, and the terror, 340 tons, were selected by Ross, and when their bows had been strengthened, he had at his disposal the first vessels that could be navigated among the southern pack ice. A detailed account of Ross's achievements cannot be given, but of them, Captain Scott wrote, quote,

The high mountain ranges and the coastline of Victoria land were laid down with comparative accuracy from Cape North and latitude 71 to Wood Bay and latitude 7.1, and latitude 74, and their extension was indicated less definitely to McMurdo Bay and latitude 77 and one-half. Few things could have looked more hopeless than an attack on that ice-bound region which lay within the Antarctic Circle. Yet out of this desolate prospect, Rouse rested an open sea, a vast mountain region, a smoking volcano, Erebus, and a hundred problems of interest to the geographer, end quote.

The highest latitude reached by Ross was 78 degrees 10 minutes south and he described the huge wall of ice which he cited there and named the great barrier as a mighty and wonderful object far beyond anything we could have thought of

or conceived. This barrier was in later years found to be 400 miles wide and of even greater length. Slowly, very slowly the far south was being compelled to reveal some of its secrets. But in spite of the interest and enthusiasm caused by Ross's discoveries, many years passed after his return to England in 1843, before further steps

were taken to make geographical discoveries in the Antarctic. But during this period in which geographical enterprise languished, scientific research was being carried on. A great desire to increase the knowledge of the science of oceanography had sprung up, and and as a practical outcome of the labors of scientists and inventors, the Challenger expedition, excellently equipped for scientific research, was set out under the command of Captain Nair's in January 1873. This expedition was in itself most important, but it is not belittling it to say that part of its value

in the history of Antarctic exploration lies in the fact that it stimulated interest in the Far South, and this interest gradually increased until the wish to solve the mysteries of the South Polar regions became dominant in the minds of many men in England and Germany. In 1885, the British Association appointed an Antarctic committee, and some two years later, this committee reported in favor of further exploration. Great difficulties, chiefly financial, had, however, to be faced by the supporters of this expedition, and a shrewd blow was received when the Board of Trade refused to recommend a grant of money

because there were no trade returns from the Antarctic regions, a reply that might produce a derisive smile from the most zealous of economists. For the moment, the idea of Antarctic exploration had received a decided setback. But determined men were working to conquer the practical difficulties, and none more determined than Sir Clement's Markham, who was elected president of the Royal Geographical Society in May 1893. No sooner was it generally known that a real effort was being made in England to make further discoveries in Antarctica, as it was by this time called,

than several other countries were stimulated at various dates to send out expeditions. Borch Grevenik, a Norwegian, de Gerlach, a Belgian, Aro Nordensky Old, a Swede, and Charcoal, a Frenchman, led expeditions, all of which did valuable work in the South. In November 1893, a meeting of the Royal Geographical Society was held and the duties of the projected British expedition were stated. The first duty was to determine the nature and extent to the Antarctic continent. The fifth was to obtain as complete a series as possible

of magnetic and meteorological observations. Such an expedition was intended both to encourage, maritime enterprise, and to add to the world's knowledge. From the outset, the promoters had decided that their expedition should be under naval control, but the government could not be persuaded to take charge of it. The Admiralty, however, assisted both with the loan of instruments and by granting leave to officers and men on full pay. Inumerable obstacles continued to hamper the promoters on every side, but they were slowly removed and at last the ship was launched at Dundee in March 1901

and christened the discovery. Sir Clements Markham, 14 years before, had, in his own mind, selected the fittest commander if an expedition to the South ever became practicable. The name of this commander

was Robert Falcon Scott, and after much opposition had been overcome, opposition which Sir Clements described as harder to force a way through than the most impenetrable of ice packs, Scott's appointment was confirmed. A great attack upon the Antarctic regions was about to be made,

but it is worthy of record that in the instructions issued to Captain Scott, no mention of the South Pole as an objective was made. By July, the labor of preparations for the expedition was almost finished, and on August 5, 1901, the discovery was visited by King Edward the Seventh and Queen Alexandra, and then started on her adventurous voyage. We can easily understand Scott's anxiety to be up and away, for he had no polar experience to help and guide him, and his desire to justify the confidence placed in him must have been intense. In the discovery, in addition to Scott himself, were several men whose names were destined to become famous in the history of polar exploration.

Ernest H. Shackleton was a second lieutenant. Ernest A. Wilson was described as surgeon, artist, and vertebrate zoologists. Edgar Evans was a petty officer. Frank Wilde and Thomas Crian were A.B.'s. William Lashley was a stoker. Surely the nucleus of a goodly company. Littleton, New Zealand, had been chosen for the headquarters of the expedition in the south. and the discovery arrived there on 30th November.

She stayed for three weeks to refit and take in provisions and then started upon the next stage of her eventful journey. The Antarctic Circle was crossed on the 3rd January, and soon afterwards the pack was on all sides of the ship. But she behaved splendidly, and Scott was delighted with the way she forced herself through the ice. Scott's original intention had been that the discovery should not winter in the Antarctic, but that, having landed a party of men, she should return northward

before the ice made such a journey impossible. A hut had been provided for this party, but in February a spot was found in McMurdo Sound in which it was thought that the ship would pass the winter in safety. Consequently, Scott decided to use the discovery as his headquarters and to utilize the hut for other purposes. The task of erecting the huts, in addition to the main hut, there were two smaller ones for magnetic work, was difficult, but it was eventually accomplished, and the party began to settle down to spend the approaching winter. Before, however, the winter set in, Scott, knowing how ignorant he and his companions were of sledging,

was anxious to gain as much experience as possible, and the result of the sledging expeditions that were made only showed how urgently this experience was needed. Early in March, Scott wrote, quote, Even at this time, I was conscious how much there was to be learned, and I felt that we must buy our experience through many a discomfort. And on looking back, I am only astonished that we bought that experience so cheaply, for clearly there were the elements of catastrophe as well as a discomfort

in the disorganized condition in which our sledge parties left the ship. In quote. When the discovery was brought into McMurdo's sound, there was good reason to suppose that she would soon be frozen in. But weeks passed before the sea became frozen, and until a ship was firmly fixed in the ice, there was always a chance that she might be driven away by a gale and be unable to return. This uncertainty hampered operations for some time, and it was not until the last days of March 1902 that the ship was satisfactory. actually frozen in. The sun departed at the end of April, and during the long winter that followed, the party of explorers had much to occupy them and to discuss. Scott had taken dogs with him for sledging purposes, but although he knew that they must increase his radius of action,

he always detested the idea of using them because of the suffering that must necessarily be caused. but the question of using dogs was only one of the many problems in connection with sledging that was debated during that Antarctic winter. In judging the journeys that followed in the spring, it is to be remembered that as far as the Antarctic regions are concerned, they were pioneer efforts, and also that the conditions of the Antarctic sledging differ considerably from those of the Arctic. In these journeys, Scott and his companions were taught lessons that were afterwards of

greatest value to other explorers as well as to themselves, lessons that nothing except experience could teach. The journey that Scott, with Wilson, Shackleton, and several dogs began on the second of November, with the object of pushing as far south as possible, was accompanied at the outset by a supporting party. But this party turned back by the 15th, and Scott, Wilson, and Shackleton had immediate cause to know how strenuous a task they had before them. The dogs were already causing anxiety and were quite unable to do the work expected from them. Relay work, which meant that each mile had to be traveled three times,

became the order of the day, and in consequence the advance toward the south was greatly hindered. Soon afterwards, the men themselves began to suffer from blistered noses, cracked lips, and painful eyes. but on the 21st, Scott took a meridian altitude and found the latitude to be 80 degrees one minute south. In spite of all discomforts and anxieties, Scott was in a happy mood that night when he wrote, well, all our charts of the Antarctic region show a plain white circle beyond the 80th parallel. It has always been our ambition to get inside that white space, and now we are there,

the space can no longer be a blank. This compensates for a lot of trouble, end quote. As the advance laboriously continued, the condition of the dogs to Scott's poignant sorrow went from bad to worse, and by 21st December the question of turning back had to be considered. At this time, additional anxiety was caused by Shackleton, who was showing symptoms of scurvy. But Christmas Day was in sight,

and as on that festival the travelers had decided to have a really sad, a satisfying meal, they resolved to push on farther. Their meal on Christmas Day put new life into the party, but they realized all too acutely that their food supplies were so inadequate that if they were to continue the advance, they must be prepared to face the risk of famine. There were, however, strong incentives to urge them on their way. Each day took them farther and farther into regions hitherto untrodden by the feet of men.

who can blame them for taking the risks that were involved in their determination to continue the march. But on 27th December, Wilson, whose industry in sketching and determination not to give in were beyond praise, was suffering so severely from snow blindness that he had to march blindfold, and at last the decision to turn back had to be made. Observations taken at their last camp showed that they had reached between 82 degrees 169, minutes and 82 degrees 17 minutes south, a finer record than Scott anticipated after he had realized that the dogs were unable to fulfill the hopes placed in them. The return march was a prolonged period of suspense. By January 9, 1903, only four out of the 19 dogs which had started on the journey were

alive, and on the 15th, the last of them had to be killed. I think, Scott wrote, we could all have wept. Even more serious was the fact that at this time, Shackleton became seriously ill. A grim struggle followed, for although Shackleton showed unending courage, he was suffering severely from scurvy, and Scott and Wilson,

who were themselves attacked in a lesser degree by this disease, often had caused to wonder whether this return journey was not beyond their powers. It was with feelings of profound thankful that at the beginning of February, Scott and his companions reached the ship. For 93 days they had been on the march, and during that time they had traveled 960 statute miles. When the explorers reached their goal, they found that the relief ship, the morning, had arrived, and Shackleton returned in her. But the discovery, after being so reluctant to freeze firmly into the ice,

refused entirely to thaw out, and consequently Scott, and most of his original parties spent a second winter in the Antarctic. During this additional year, Scott, with Edgar Evans and Lashley as his companions, made a wonderful Western journey in which adventures enough to last ordinary men for a lifetime were almost part of the daily routine. Not until February 1904 was the discovery freed from the ice, and on 10th September she reached Spithead after an absence from England of over three years. In those years, a crop of most useful information had been gathered, and many geographical discoveries had been made. Among the latter were King Edwardland, Ross Island, and the Victoria Mountains,

and, most important of all, the great ice cap on which the South Pole is situated. Not for some years yet was the South Pole to reveal its secret, but Scott's first expedition may truthfully be said to have shown the way towards that revelation. In the years to come, Amundsen frankly admitted how carefully he and his companions studied the accounts of Scots and Shackleton's expeditions. After Scott's return from his first visit to the Antarctic, no further attempt was immediately made to visit the far south. But that great explorer, Ernest Shackleton, had seen enough of the South to be gripped by the desire to solve more of its problems,

and in the Geographical Journal of March 1907, he stated the program of a proposed expedition. In this program, Shackleton said, quote, I do not intend to sacrifice the scientific utility of the expedition to a mere record-breaking journey, but say frankly all the same that one of my great efforts will be to reach the southern geographical pole,

end quote. The financial difficulties that seemed to be inseparable from polar expeditions followed, but they were ultimately removed and on July 30, 1907, the Nimrod sailed for New Zealand. Bearing in mind the failure of the dogs

in Scott's expedition, Shackleton decided to use Manchurian ponies as his principal means of traction. The utmost care was taken in preparing the equipment and in choosing the staff to accompany the expedition. Shackleton intended to land a shore party, and among this party were Frank Wilde and Ernest Joyce, who had been with Scott, Douglas Mawson, Lieutenant J.B. Adams, Dr. E. Marshall, Raymond Priestley and G. E. Marston. Before leaving England, Shackleton decided, if possible, to establish his winter quarters on King Edward's seventh land, in preference to Scott's old quarters at Hutt Point in McMurdo Sound. But he was unable to carry out this plan, and ultimately he landed close to Cape Roids on the east coast of Ross Island. On February 22, 1908, his ship, the Nimrod,

started upon her journey to New Zealand. The winter quarters that had necessarily to be chosen were separated from Hunt Point by some 20 miles of frozen ice, and Shackleton was greatly disappointed that he was prevented from landing on King Edward Seventhland, where he would not only have broken fresh ground, but would also have been considerably nearer to the pole. In the light of subsequent events, it is of interest to note that Chackleton, in his search for winter quarters off the barrier, looked with eagerness upon a bay which he named the Bay of Whales, but owing to the conditions of the ice, he thought it necessary to leave this spot as quickly as possible. In another respect, this expedition met with poor fortune, namely in the loss of ponies.

When the party settled down to spend the winter, only four ponies were still alive, and it is no cause for wonder that they were watched with the closest attention. And as a Manchurian pony has been dowed with more than his fair share of original sin, he requires a very great deal of watching. Before the winter set in, an attempt was made to reach the top of Mount Arabas, and this attempt met with a success that acted as a tonic, both to those who took part in it, and to those who had remained in winter quarters. As soon as midwinter day had passed, Shackleton began to make arrangements for the sledging work that had to be done in the approaching spring. Depos had to be laid in the direction of the South Pole, which was over 880 statute miles distant from Cape Roids.

These preparations went on apace, and with a view to starting on the southern march from the nearest possible point to the pole, stores and the like were transferred to hut point, and depots were also laid to help the travelers on their way. Adams, Marshall, and Wilde were chosen to accompany Shackleton in this determined effort to reach the South Pole, and on the 29th of October they set out with the four ponies and the four sledges. By 3rd November, they had left the sea ice and were on the barrier, but instead of finding a better surface, they found it increasingly difficult. At the outset, however, the ponies did splendid work, though one of them on the 9th November nearly disappeared into a great fathomless chasm.

At the time the travelers were in a nest of crevasses, and Adams' pony suddenly went down a crack. Fortunately, with help from Wild and Shackleton, the pony and the sledge were saved from falling into this abyss, but it was an alarming incident, for as all the cooking gear and biscuits and a large portion of the oil were on this sledge, the loss of it would have been an irretrievable disaster to the southern journey. The 26th of November was a day to be remembered by Shackleton and his companions, for at night they found they had reached a latitude 82 degrees 18 minutes south, and so had passed Scots farthest south. On 1st December, latitude 83 degrees 16 minutes south was reached,

but by this time three of the ponies had been killed, and only one was left. A few days later, this last pony disappeared down a crevasse and nearly took Wild in the sledge with him. Serious as a loss of this gallant pony was, there was great cause for thankfulness that Wilde in the sledge had almost miraculously been saved. Had the sledge gone, only two sleeping bags would have been left for the four men,

and the equipment would have been so short that the explorers could scarcely have got back to winter quarters. Presently the travelers left the barrier and attacked the great Beardmore Glacier, which was between them and the plateau. On the 9th of December, 340 geographical miles lay between them and the pole, and progress was painfully slow, for the surface consisted mainly of rotten ice through which their feet continually broke. A week later, they had traveled over nearly 100 miles,

of crevassed ice, and had risen 6,000 feet. But the plateau, which they so eagerly longed to reach, still lay ahead of them. Never, Shackleton wrote, do I expect to meet anything more cantalizing than the plateau. Appalling surfaces to walk on which wild described as like walking over the glass roof of a station continued after the plateau had been reached, and before Christmas arrived it was obvious if the advance was to be continued that absolute hunger amounting almost to starvation stared the explorers in the face. On the evening of New Year's Day, 1909, the pole was only 172 and a half miles distant, but the men's strength was nearly exhausted. The thermometer remained obstinately below zero, and on the 6th of January there were over 50 degrees of frost with a blizzard

and drift. A last dash onwards followed, and on 9th January, Shackleton and his party reached 88 degrees, 23 minutes south, and left the Union Jack flying on the plateau. The attempt to reach the pole had failed, but it was a gallant attempt, and the homeward marches that followed showed clearly enough that to have advanced farther was beyond the powers of the men. Indeed, the return journey was a terrible experience, a grim struggle against starvation, and to add to the misery of it, dysentery, owing and shackled his opinion to eating diseased ponies meat, attacked each member of the party. All that was possible had been done, and had not the wind been behind the explorers during one of their acutest periods of suffering, it is improbable that they would ever have reached their winter

quarters. While Shackleton was making his great march, a party consisting of David, Mawson, and McKay had set out with a view to determining the position of the south magnetic pole. In this they were successful, the mean position of the magnetic pole being marked down by Mosson as in latitude 72 degrees, 25 minutes south, longitude 155 degrees, 16 minutes. This was a great triumph for the explorers, and, needless to say, it was not gained without many perilous adventures and narrow escapes. In March 1909, the Nimrod returned safely to Littleton, New Zealand, where Shackleton and his men met with the warmest of welcomes. Once again, the South Pole had resisted the attempt to locate it, but the time was drawing near for its mysteries to be disclosed.

End of Chapter 5, Part 1 Chapter 5 of The Last Secrets by John Buckin. This Libra Box recording is in the public domain. Chapter 5, the South Pole Part 2. When, on September 13, 1909, Captain Scott published his plans for a British Antarctic expedition in the following year, Rold Amundsen was not thinking about the far south. The Fram, it is true, was being prepared for a third voyage, but the Arctic was again to be her destination.

Then, during the September of 1909, came the news that Peary had reached the North Pole. One of the great secrets of the world had been revealed, but another was still undiscovered, and Amundsen's thoughts were promptly turned from the Arctic to the Antarctic. For various reasons, Amundsen did not announce his change of plans, and when the Fram sailed in August 1910, only a very few people knew where she was bound for. Not until the ship left Madeira did Amundsen announce his destination to the men who were accompanying him, and they received the news with joy. In two or three respects, Amundsen's expedition differed considerably from Scott's new expedition.

Amundsen, for instance, relied on dogs for his motive power. Scott relied on ponies. Then, again, Amundsen decided to make his winter headquarters off the Bay of Whales, which was a degree farther south than McMurdo Sound where Scott wintered. Scott was to take the Beardmore Glacier as his route to the South Pole. Amundsen's plan, when he set out for the pole, was to leave Scott's route alone and push straight south from his starting place. our starting point lay three hundred and fifty geographical miles amundsen wrote from scott's winter quarters in micmurdo sound so there could be no question of enroaching upon his sphere of action

lastly it must be mentioned that the norwegians were as at home on ski as they were on their feet while most of scotsmen were at their best only moderate performers upon ski all went well with the fram on her voyage to the south She crossed the Antarctic Circle on January 2nd, 1911, and 12 days later she was in the Bay of Wales. In landing on the Great Barrier, Amundsen knew that he was taking a considerable amount of risk, for there was no certainty that it was not afloat where he landed on it from the Bay of Wales. In Amundsen's opinion, however, the barrier there rests upon a good solid foundation, probably in the form of small islands, scleries, or shoals. And indeed, the barrier treated him well. The landing was performed with supremies,

and enough seals were found to relieve any possible anxiety as to the supply of fresh meat. Penguins, those delightful birds, which provide both humor and food for visitors to Antarctica, were not plentiful, and those that were seen were chiefly of the Adili species. Framheim, the hut in which the South Pole Party were to live during the winter, was soon erected, and Amundsen found infinite satisfaction in the number of dogs which were safely landed.

So, far from losing dogs on the voyage, he had started with 97 and finished with 116, a most welcome edition. The Fram, leaving eight men to winter on shore, was due to sail in the middle of February, an oceanographical cruise, but before leaving she received some unexpected visitors. On the 4th of February, Captain Scott's ship, the Terra Nova, with a party which had vainly hoped to land on King Edward's 7th land, came into the Bay of Wales. The news that Amundsen was safely established reached Scott on the 22nd of February, and he could not fail to be impressed by it. Quote, One thing only, he wrote characteristically,

fixes itself definitely in my mind. The proper as well as the wiser course for us is to proceed exactly as though this had not happened, to go forward and do our best for the honor of the country without fear or panic. There is no doubt that Amundsen's plan is a very serious menace to ours. He has a shorter distance to the pole by 60 miles. I never thought he could have got,

out so many dogs safely to the ice. But above and beyond all, he can start his journey early in the season, an impossible condition with ponies. Words that, in the light of future events, are more than ordinarily significant. Before the winter set in, Amundsen determined to deposit food and the like on the way to the pole, and on the 10th February he set out on his first journey with three men, three sledges, and 18 dogs. The first trip upon the barrier was full of exciting possibilities. Amundsen was without knowledge of the ground over which he had to travel, and he did not know whether the dogs would respond to the demands made upon them,

or if his outfit would stand the severe test to which it was to be put. This was essentially a trial trip, and the travelers were naturally anxious that it should be successful. 80 degrees south was reached, and in every respect, save one, Amundsen was satisfied with his journey. The only fly in his ointment was that time had been wasted in preparations before the party was ready to start in the mornings. But it was only a small fly, and Amundsen knew that with thought it could easily be removed. The dogs had responded so splendidly to the calls made upon them that, perhaps the most important question of all, had been satisfactorily answered.

More depot-laying expeditions followed, and before the winter closed around the explorers, they had placed three tons of supplies at depots in latitudes 80 degrees, 81 degrees, and 82 degrees south. Amundsen and his men could, therefore, settle down for their period of waiting with justifiable hopes that the great spring march to the pole would end in triumph. the winter was spent in paying attention to the minutest details of equipment and the inhabitants of framheim were kept gloriously busy and contented but with the coming of spring amundsen began to be impatient to be up and away on his great journey temperatures however remained very low somewhere in the neighborhood of minus sixty degrees fahrenheit and until they ceased to grovel in the depths no start could be made With the beginning of September, the temperatures began to improve, and Amundsen was determined to start as soon as he possibly could, arguing that he could turn around and come back if he found that he had started too soon. So on the 8th of September, he did set out, and soon discovered that the dogs could not endure the intense cold.

On the 11th, the temperature was minus 67.9 degrees Fahrenheit. On the following day, it was minus 61.9.5.5. On the following day, it was minus 61. point six degrees Fahrenheit, with a breeze dead against the travelers. On reaching the 80-degree South Depot, Amundsen deposited more stores, and then returned to Framheim. More than a month passed before the South Pole Party was able to make another start, and it is of interest to note that, whereas Amundsen ultimately got off on the 19th of October, Scott was unable to start before the 1st of November. The South Pole Party, which set out from Framheim, consisted of Amundsen, Hansen, Whisting, Hossel, and Bajaland, and they were accompanied by 52 dogs drawing four sledges.

As an illustration of the dangers that lay between the explorers in the pole, it is enough to say that on the first day's journey, a terrible disaster was only avoided by a few inches. In the thick weather they had steered too far to the east and almost fell into what Amundsen describes as a yawning black abyss large enough to us swallowed us all and a little more. On the 21st, Bajalan sledge sank down a crevasse and had to be unloaded before it could be brought again to the surface. Whisting, with alpine rope fastened around him,

went down and unloaded the sledge, and when he came up again and was asked if he was not glad to be out of such a position he replied, It was nice and warm down there. It is true that such events are far from unusual in the lives of polar explorers, but Whisting's answer is worth quoting, because it is typical of the cheerful spirit

shown by Amundsen's companions during the whole of the journey. In temperament, they were admirably suited for the task that they had undertaken. With a view to landmarks on the return journey, Amundsen, rightly leaving, nothing more to chance than he could help, decided to build snow beacons. The first beacon was built in 80 degrees 23 minutes south,

and altogether 150 beacons were erected six feet in height. Up to 82 degrees south, the course had already been traveled by depot-laying parties, but when, on the 6th of November, they left 82 south behind them, their journey was absolutely into the unknown. At this time, they were marching about 20,000. 23 miles daily, and at this rate they advanced a degree in three days. On reaching 83 degrees south, the explorers deposited provisions for five men and 12 dogs for four days, and depots were subsequently made at 84 degrees south and 85 degrees south.

It was from the latter depot that they decided to make what may, without exaggeration, be called their dash for the pole. From their camp at 85 degrees south, the distance to the pole and back was 683 miles. After consideration, Amundsen determined to take forward provisions and so forth for 60 days on the sledges and depot the rest of the supplies and outfit. A weary ascent to the plateau lay before the explorers, and they started upon it on the 17th of November. Three days later they had reached the plateau, but all gone. they were happy enough in having accomplished a long and dangerous climb, their first camp on the

plateau was not one of happy memory. Grim work had to be done. Amundsen arrived on the plateau with 42 dogs, but 24 of them had to be killed when the plateau was reached. It was a sacrifice that had to be made if the success of the expedition was to be considered. But no one can read Amundsen's account of it without recognizing how bitterly he and his companions regretted the necessity. This camp, not without reason, was called a butcher shop, and as both the men and dogs required rest before setting out on the final stages of their march, it had been decided to remain there for two days. The 18 remaining dogs were divided into three teams with six dogs in each team, and one sledge was left behind.

But owing to the weather, the explorers could not leave this hated butcher shop until the 25th of November, and when they did set out again, a blizzard was blowing. So tired, however, were they of waiting in such an inhospitable and gruesome spot, that all of them were eager to quit it, whatever the condition of the weather might be. Fog subsequently impeded the party, and again and again Amundsen blessed the assistance that they received from ski. I am not, he wrote, giving too much credit to our excellent ski when I say that they not only played a very important part, but possibly the most important part of all, on our journey to the South Pole. Many a time we traverse stretches of surface so cleft and disturbed that it would

have been an impossibility to get over them on foot. The 7th December was a great day for the expedition because during it they passed Shackleton's farthest south, 88 degrees, 23 minutes. south. They proceeded for another two miles and then determined to make their last depot. So important to them was this depot that they not only marked it at right angles to their course, but also by snow beacons at every two miles to the south. As the explorers approached the pole, Amundsen, very naturally, was beset by nervousness. Would he be the first? Was a question that kept on recurring in his mind. There was no cause to worry, blessed by fine weather, he and his companions reached the South Pole on December 14th, 1911,

and the five of them together planted the pole from which the Norwegian flag flew. Thus we plant the beloved flag at the South Pole, and give to the plan on which it lies the name of King Hackon Seventh's Plateau. On this day, Scott was still struggling on his great march to the same destination, which he reached in the third week of January. The calculations that Amundsen carried out at the South Pole gave its latitude as 89 degrees 56 minutes south. Amundsen had won the race, and with his victory had revealed one of the great secrets of the world. His success had been gained by strenuous labor, great courage, and infinite care.

And if Britons connect Scott's name inseparably with the South Pole and honor it as that of one of their heroes, they do not for a moment grudge Amundsen the honor due to him as one of the greatest explorers of all time. For Amundsen was the first to discover the South Pole, and no one wishes or is likely to forget it. The Norwegians reached the Pole with 17 dogs, one of which had to be killed there, and they traveled back with two sledges, a team of eight dogs in each sledge. On its return journey, Amundsen was fortunate enough to meet with favorable winds and weather, and the explorers arrived at Framheim on January 25, 1912, having traveled 1,860 miles in 99 days. It was a glorious achievement, a great victory over conditions that

are scarcely conceivable to anyone unacquainted with the Antarctic or Arctic regions. To pass from Amundsen's expedition to Scott's last expedition is to turn from one splendid exploit to another. Scott, as everyone knows, was beaten in the actual race for the South Pole, but he and his friends reached their goal, and the tale of their struggle against misfortune after reaching it is one of the finest and most pathetic in the world. When Scott's intentions to lead another Antarctic expedition were known, no less than 8,000 applicants volunteered to go with him, and among this enormous numbers were several men whose names will forever find a place in the history of polar exploration.

When the Taranova sailed from Littleton, New Zealand for the Antarctic regions on November 29, 1910, she carried both ponies and dogs. Three motor sledges, of which one was lost in landing, were also taken, and Scott, with his intense dislike for the cruelty inseparably connected with the use of animals for motie power, hope that these sledges would do much to save the ponies and dogs. Owing to engine trouble, these hopes were not realized, but in connection with them, Sir Clements Markham is written, quote, Captain Scott was quite on the right tack, and with more experience, his idea of polar motors will hereafter be made feasible, a consummation which was very dear to his heart, end quote.

The Terra Nova was by no means as fortunate as the discovery in making her way to the Antarctic. At the beginning of December, she encountered a prolonged and terrific storm, and subsequently she had to fight her passage through some 370 miles of ice. Not until January 3, 1911 did she reach the barrier, five miles east of Cape Crozier. Here Scott had hoped to make his winter quarters, but owing to the swell, no landing could be made, and on the following day he decided to land at Cape Evans, 14 miles north of the Discovery's winter quarters. Strenuous work followed, and in a few days, everything necessary had been landed from the ship. The house was soon built, and the explorers were ready to start laying depots in preparation for the march to the pole. On his first depot-laying

journey, Scott was accompanied by 11 men, eight ponies, and 26 dogs. He was more than a little doubtful about the dogs but thought his ponies were bound to be a success. They work, he wrote, with such extraordinary steadiness. The great drawback is the ease with which they sink into the soft snow. They struggle pluckily, but it is trying to watch them. This depot-laying party reached latitude 79 degrees, 29 minutes south, and there it left over a ton of stores. Consequently, the name of one-ton camp was bestowed upon it. On the return journey, disasters happened that seriously affected the success of the expedition, for six out of the eight ponies were lost. Everything out of joint with the loss of our ponies, but mercifully with all the party alive and well, is Scott's comment on

this grave misfortune. Ten ponies still remained. During the winter, Wilson, Bowers, and Cherry Garard started on June 27, 1911, on their famous journey to Cape Crozier to visit the Emperor Penguin Rookery, and they did not return to Cape Evans until the 1st of August. During these weeks, they had to fight against appallingly low temperatures. When, for instance, they started from Cape Evans, their three sleeping bags weighed 52 pounds, but owing to the ice that had collected upon them, these three bags weighed 118 pounds when the traveler's returned. Scott considered that no praise was too high for men who would face such weather during the polar winter. With the beginning of August, preparations for the Great March went on apace,

but it was not until the first of November that a start could be made from Cape Evans. Night marching was decided upon, and the order of marching was at first settled by the speed of the ponies, for some of them were slow, some fairly fast, and some were flyers. The motors, with E.R. Evans, Day, Lashley, and Hooper with them, had already started, and the dogs under the control of Mears and Dmitri were to follow behind the last detachment of men and ponies. Very soon, however, the motor party were in trouble, and this party had to abandon their machines and push on as a man-hauling party. By the 15th of November, Scotch reached one-ton camp, and fears about the ponies began to take shape. At Camp 19, the explorers were within 150 miles of the

Beardmore Glacier, but some of the ponies were beginning to fail, and at the next camp, the first of them, the Gallant Jayhu, had to be shot. From this camp, it was arranged that Dey and Hooper should turn back. At Camp 22, the Middle Barrier Depot was made in latitude 81 degrees, 35 minutes, and then for some days the march was impeded by extraordinarily foul weather. Scott's desire was to take the ponies as far as the entrance to the Beardmore Glacier, but although on the 29th November at Camp 5, they were only 70 miles from what he calls his pony goal, some of the willing animals were very tired. At Camp 29, six ponies were still left out of the ten which had started, but although the chances

of getting through successfully to the glacier were good, the weather still remained as obstructive as possible. On the 5th of December, a terrific fall of snow added to the anxieties of the explorers, who found themselves within 12 miles of the glacier, but hopelessly

held up by such a violent and unexpected storm. It was natural enough for Scott to be anxious, for on the 7th of December the food that he had hoped, only to use after the glacier was reached, had to be begun on. Two days later, however, by marching under terrible conditions,

the entrance to the glacier was gained, and then at Camp 31, which was called Shambles Camp, the last of the ponies were killed. On the 9th of December, Wilson wrote, Nobby, Wilson's special pony, had all my biscuits last night and this morning, and by the time we camped I was just, ravenously hungry. Thank God the horses are now all done with, and we begin the heavy work

ourselves. At Camp 32, the Lower Glacier Depot was built, and soon afterwards Mears and Dimitri with the dogs turned back for home. At this time, the parties were made up of Sledge 1, Scott, Wilson, Oates, and Peel Evans, Sledge 2, E. Evans, Atkinson, Wright, and Lashley. Sledge 3, 3, Bowers, Cherry Gerard, Kean, and Coahein. But by the 21st of December, in latitude 85 degrees south, Scott had to send back four of these men, and Atkinson, Wright, Cherry Gerard, and Coahean returned. The Upper Glacier Depot was made,

and the returning men took back a letter from Scott, in which he wrote, quote, So here we are practically on the summit and up to date in the provision line. We ought to get through, end quote. On New Year's Day 1912, the party were within 170 miles of the pole. Three-degree depot was made. Then in latitude 87 degrees, 32 minutes south, Scott was compelled to send back E.R. Evans,

Crian, and Lashley. When all of the men were so anxious to go on, it was hard to have to part with any of them, but questions of food made it absolutely necessary. that some of the party should return. The ages of the five men who marched on to the pole were, Scott, 43 years old, Wilson 39, P.O. Evans, 37, Oates, 32, and Bowers, 28.

Again and again, Scott expressed his admiration of his four companions. Wilson, never wavering from the start to finish, Evans, a giant worker, Bowers, Ours, O'Fourke, marvel he is thoroughly enjoying himself. Oates goes hard all the time. With such men, Scott felt confident in spite of terrible surfaces of reaching the pole. But as he approached it, fears that Amundsen had already arrived were constantly besetting him, and on the 16th of January, when within a few miles of the long-for goal, there was no longer any doubt that the Norwegian party had won the race.

Sledge and ski tracks and the traces of dogs were all too evident. Faced by such a grievous blow, not one of Scott's party could sleep that night, but on the day following they marched on some 14 miles and reached the pole. The pole, Scott wrote, yes, but under very different circumstances from those expected. It is impossible to conceive a greater blow, and when it is remembered that Scott and his four companions were already fatigued, if not completely exhausted, by their tremendous labors, it is easy to realize how heavily the disappointment hung on their minds. Nevertheless, they had set out to reach the pole, and they had reached it. All honor is due to them, and the fact that Amundsen had

preceded them in no way diminished the glory of their achievement. The altitude of the pole is estimated by Scott is about 9,500 feet. A Karen was built and the Union jack hoisted. And then on Thursday, 18th January, they turned their backs upon their goal and began the long march that separated them from Cape Evans. Anxiety about food began at once. Not until three-degree depot was reached, could it be lessened, and very soon anxiety at Evans' condition was added to the danger of the scarcity of food. On Wednesday, the 31st of January, the weary travelers reached the three-degree depot, but by this time Evans had dislodged two fingernails, and his general condition was very bad. Their next objective was the Upper Glacier Depot, and on Monday night, the 5th of February,

they were within from 25 to 30 miles of it, but so critical had the health of Evans become that Scott was desperately eager to get off the plateau. Things, he wrote, may mend for him, Evans, on the glacier, and his wounds get some respite under warmer conditions. On the evening of the 7th of February, they reached the Upper Glacier Depot, and then, after turning aside to collect geological specimens, which proved to be the most valuable, they met with terrible surfaces and weather. On the 14th of February, with 30 miles still to go before the lower Glacier Depot was reached,

Scott's anxiety about the condition of the party was acute. Indeed, poor Emmons had almost reached the limit of human endurance, and during the night of 17th February, he became unconscious and died quietly at 1230 a.m. It was a terrible experience for men, already supremely fatigue, both in mind and body, to meet, and it was a sorrowful party which on Sunday afternoon arrived at Shambles camp. There, horse meat and plenty awaited them, and this gave them the renewal of strength that was sadly needed. For the moment, the prospects of the explorers looked a little more hopeful, but from this point of their march they began to suffer from a lack of oil. When at length they succeeded in arriving at the Middle Barrier Depot, and on the 2nd of March they found so little

oil that it was scarcely enough, however economically used, to carry them on to the next depot, which was 71 miles distant. Another irretrievable disaster was the fact that Oates' feet were very badly frostbitten. On the 4th of March, Scott wrote, quote, I don't know what I should do if Wilson and Bowers weren't so determinedly cheerful over things, end quote. And in all truth, the position had become desperate. On the seventh, when still 16 miles short of Mount Hooper Depot, Oates, though wonderfully brave, was in terrible pain. During the next day they arrived at Mount Hooper,

but the shortage of oil was not relieved. Over 70 miles separated the exhausted travelers from one-ton camp, and they struggled onwards with death staring them ever nearer and nearer in the face. With no helping wind and bad surfaces, they could not advance more than six miles a day, and on the night of the 11th, Scott reckoned up the situation in these words, quote, We have seven days food and should be about 55 miles from one-ton camp tonight. Six times seven equals 42, leaving us 13 miles short of our distance, even if things get no worse, end quote.

Unhappily, instead of any improvement in the situation, misfortunes became more and more plentiful. It was obvious that Oates was near the end, and on the morning of the 15th or 16th, when the blizzard was blowing, he walked out of the tent. I am just going outside and maybe some time, where the last words he spoke to his companions in distress. We knew, said Scott, who still continued to write his journal, that poor Oates was walking to his death.

It was the act of a brave man and English gentleman. Oates sacrificed himself in the hope of helping the others, and no brave man ever performed a braver act. But his sacrifice was of no avail. Fortune had declared too strong a hand against the explorers for them to be able to resist it. By midday on 18th of March, Scott, Wilson, and Bowers had struggled on to within 21 miles of one-ton depot, and during the afternoon of the following day, they managed to advance another 10 miles. And then they made what was destined to be their last camp.

The men themselves were in a pitiable condition, and blizzard following blizzard they were utterly unable to march a step farther. On the 29th of March, Scott wrote, quote, since the 21st, we have had a continuous gale from the west-southwest and southwest. We had fuel to make two cups of tea apiece and bare food for two days on the 20th. Every day we have been ready to start for our depot 11 miles away, but outside the door of the tent, it remains a scene of whirling drift. We shall stick it out to the end, but we are getting weaker, of course, and the end cannot be far.

It seems a pity, but I do not think I can write more, end quote. And then follows those pathetic words, quote, last entry, for God's sake, look after our people, end quote. It was not until the 30th of October that Atkinson, on whom the leadership of the expedition had fallen, was able to take out a search party. And nearly a fortnight later, the bodies of these three friends and explorers were found. No more fitting words could be found with which to conclude this chapter of great deeds than those which were left in the metal cylinder on the grave of these heroes. Quote, November 12th, 1912, latitude 79 degrees, 50 minutes south.

This cross and Karen are erected over the bodies of Captain Scott, C.V.O.R. N., Dr. E.A. Wilson, M.B.C., and Lieutenant H.R. Bowers, Royal Indian Marine, a slight token to perpetuate their successful and gallant attempt to reach the pole. This they did on January 17, 1912, after the Norwegian expedition had already done so. In clement weather with lack of fuel was the cause of their death, and to commemorate their two gallant comrades, Captain L.A.G. Oates of the Ineskilling dragoons who walked to his death in a blizzard to save his comrades about 18 miles south of this position, also seamen Edgar Evans, who died at the foot of the Beard-Bore glacier. The Lord gave, and the Lord taketh away.

Blessed be the name of the Lord, end quote. End of Chapter 5, Part 2. Chapter 6 of the Last Secrets by John Buckin. This Libravox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 6. Mount McKinley The ascent of Ruinzori unriddled the mystery of equatorial snows. There now remained the question of great peaks in the extreme north, where the mountaineering problems must obviously be very different

from those found at a similar altitude in the temperate zones. Something had been done to solve the problem by the ascent of Mount St. Ilius in Alaska on July 31, 1897. But Mount St. Ilius was only just over 18,000 feet, and it was peculiarly accessible for it lies close to the coast on the borders of British and American territory. The eyes of explorers began to turn towards Mount McKinley, the highest peak in North America, which reached a height of 20,300 feet. Its latitude was 63 degrees north, and, and so within 250 miles of the Arctic Circle. The nearest salt water, Cook Inlet, was 140 miles from the southern face as the crow flies.

It was therefore almost unreachable, lying as it did in the midst of an unexplored wilderness and surrounded by a mighty glacier system. On the south, these glaciers were drained by the Susitna River, with its tributaries the Yetna and the Chulitna, and on its northern face by the affluence of the Yukon. If the traveler attempted to reach it in summer, he might find a difficult waterway up to the beginning of the glaciers, but then he had 30 miles of ice to cross before he reached the base,

and over these he must transport everything on his back. In winter, the journey might be made by dogs, but winter in those latitudes was scarcely the time to travel. Moreover, Mount McKinley, unlike the other great peaks in the world, rose from a low elevation. In the case of the South America and Himalayan peaks, climbing does not begin until an altitude of at least 10,000 feet has been reached, and their line of perpetual snow is very high. It is possible, for example, to cover the 22,860 feet of Akonkagua without ever touching snow. But in Mount McKinley, the snow line will be able to cover the 22, 8,860 feet of Akonkagua without ever touching snow.

was not much more than 2,500 feet, and there was something like 15,000 feet of climbing. Again, its position so far north did not permit the snows to melt properly in the summer, or to grow hard and pack. Its snowfall was so great that the snow never got into the condition which eases the path of the mountaineer. Finally, and this applied especially to a winter journey, It was situated in a land of desperate storms. The severest weather conditions ever recorded by the American Meteorological Bureau occurred at Mount Washington, which is only 6,000 feet above the sea, where the temperature was 40 degrees below zero and the wind 180 miles an hour.

What might the climber expect 20,000 feet up in the sky, with nothing between him and the North Pole? The attempt on Mount McKinley, therefore, was not a thing to be lightly undertaken. It meant a journey to the remote Alaskan coast, and then some 200 miles through difficult and little-known country before even the base was reached. What the climbing would be like, no one could tell. The obvious route, as the map was show, was the Susitna River, by which, indeed its first explorer, a young Princeton graduate called Dickie had approached it in 1896. It was he who christened it Mount McKinley. He fell into an argument with another prospector who was a rabid champion of free silver

and after Merni Wury Day's dispute retaliated by naming the mountain after the champion of the gold standard. In 1903, an expedition led by the two famous Dr. Cook reached the base from the north, but failed to do any climbing. Then, in 1906, began the explorations of Professor Parker and Mr. Belmore Brown, who were destined six years later to be the conquerors of the peak. The 1906 expedition may be roughly sketched, for, though it was a failure, it at least taught its leaders what routes were not possible. They started with pack horses and a motorboat,

with the intention of trying the northwestern face. They ascended the Yitna River, which enters the Susitna from the west, but found it impossible to cross the southern flanks of the Alaskan range. They then turned up the south side of the range and reached the glacier out of which the Toko Sitna River flows. By this time their transport was in a precarious condition and their horses could go no farther.

They were within view of Mount McKinney, and saw not only the impossibility of the southern face, but the extraordinary difficulties of approaching even its base from that direction. They accordingly returned to the coast, where Dr. Cook left them, announcing that he intended to make one final desperate attempt on the mountain. Presently, Professor Parker and Mr. Belmore Brown heard, to their surprise, the rumor that Dr. Cook had succeeded. Knowing that the feat was impossible in so short a time, they disbelieved the tale and stated their views publicly in New York. Then appeared Dr. Cook's notorious book. But before it was published, he had departed for the Arctic regions.

Geographical circles in America were torn with a controversy. A committee of the Explorers Club investigated the question, but Dr. Cook refused to give evidence. Professor Parker and Mr. Belmore Brown were, meantime, busy with their own plans for another attempt. The 1910 expedition was again directed to the southern face. Their reasons were that for most of the journey to that face, a water route was possible, and that if they failed there, they believed they would be able to go on to the southern northeast ridge, which, from what they had heard and seen, they believed to be the most promising avenue. of attack. They also wished to duplicate the photographs which Dr. Cook had published, and so prove or disprove his bona fide ace. Also, the northern side of the Great Mountain had already

been fairly well mapped, but nothing had been done on the south side. The notion of a pack train was discarded, and all their energies were directed toward designing the right kind of boat in which to ascend the Susitna and its tributary the Chulitna till they reached the glaciers. The party consisted of eight, including a young man from Seattle, Mr. Murrell-Levoy, who was exceptionally fitted by Providence

for the work of a pioneer. The present writer had many dealings with Mr. Levoy during the Great War and can confidently say that he never met anyone more intrepid, audacious, and resourceful. It was a summary time expedition, and the party left Susitna station on the 26th of May. The ascent to the two rivers

was difficult and exciting enough, but they reached without misadventure the foot of the Tokositna tributary, where they established their base camp. This camp was 37 and a half miles from Mount McKinley, and a few miles away was the terminal moraine of a great glacier, which they hoped would give them a roadway to the mountain. Up that glacier, they would have to kill. all their belongings on their backs. In Mr. Belmore Brown's narrative, there is an interesting passage describing a process by which men are hardened to wilderness work. Quote, The day's work consisted in traveling through brush, soft sand, swamps, and glacier streams for about ten hours. With the exception of one or two men who put a biscuit in their pockets, we took no food with us. The day's work was in no way

difficult, for we carried during the preliminary reconnaissance no loads. Our condition from the civilized standpoint was splendid. We were well-fed, sun-browned, and fairly hard, and yet we all came into camp thoroughly tired out. Two months after our adventures on Mount McKinley's ice flanks, we came down through the same stretch of country. The snow, however, had melted, leaving dense thickets through which we had to chop our way. Mosquitoes hung in clouds, and four of us were carrying packs running from 95 to 120 pounds. From the civilized standpoint, we were not well fed and we did not look well. Our eyes and cheeks were sunken and our bodies were worn down to bone and sinew. And yet we came into camp as fresh and happy as children, and after a bite to eat and a smoke,

we could have gone on cheerfully, end quote. It was no light task carrying an outfit of 1,200 pounds over the 37 and a half miles of glacier, a distance which by the actual route used was much farther. Most of the weight was in pemmican and alcohol for the stoves. The pemmican consisted of pulverized raw meat mixed with sugar, raisins, currants, and tallow. Their principal drink was tea. On the 11th of June they had their last wood fire, and after that there was only the stove. The days were spent in sheer hard, navvy labor, trudging along on snow shoes under heavy packs and trotting back for others. They had various misadventures. Frequent blizzards of wind and snow compelled them to shut up their tent fast at night,

with a result that on one occasion they were nearly asphyxiated. On the 27th of June they reached the head of the main glacier, beyond which, through a narrow gorge, a secondary glacier descended from the mountains. Another glacier came down on their right, and here they achieved an interesting piece of detective work. At the top of it, they saw some peaks, which recalled an illustration in Dr. Cook's book.

The illustration purported to be the summit of Mount McKinley, and showed on the left a rock shoulder, which Dr. Cook described as a cliff of 8,000 feet. It was really a faked picture of the small peaks at the head of this glacier, miles and miles from the main mountain, and the cliff of 8,000 feet turned out to only rise 300 feet above the floor, and to be only 5,300 feet above sea level. One legend, at any rate, had been dispelled forever.

Now began the patient relaying of provisions up to Great Gorge. It was desperately hard manual labor. Their faces were burnt black by the glare of the sun, and every now and then there would be a slip into a crevasse, which only the highest good fortune saved from being a tragedy. After 36 days of hard traveling, they were at last within two miles of the base of the southern cliffs of Mount McKinley. They found themselves at a great ice,

basin hemmed in by colossal precipices down which avalanches thundered. Before them rose the mountain, 15,000 feet of rock and ice. Their glasses showed them that the southwest ridge became utterly unclimable after an altitude of about 15,000 feet. The southern northeast ridge looked more promising, and to this they turned their attention. In that northern summer there was no dark. Quote, the advance and retreat of the night shadows went on with scarcely a pause, and sometimes we would be uncertain whether the alpine glow on the big mountain's icy crest was the light of the rising or the setting sun. They had now a short spell of rest from their toil,

and as the mind of man on such occasions turned to food, they invented out of their scanty larder a new pudding. Here's the recipe. Quote, first soak three broken hardtack in snow water until they are soft. Add 60 raisins and pemmican the size of four and a half eggs. Stir slowly but energetically till the mess is thoroughly amalgamated. Boils slowly over an alcohol stove, add three tablespoonfuls of granulated sugar,

and serve in a granite-ware cup, end quote. But between them and the northeast ridge lay a giant, gigantic Syrac. For a day and a half they lay stormbound under it, and then on the morning of 11th July tried to cut their way up the ice wall. It proved most difficult and dangerous work, and presently, owing to the diminishing provisions, they realized it was impossible. Again and again, they attempted it, for only that way was there a road to the northeast ridges. But at last they had to give it up as hopeless, and turned their attention to the southwest Arit. This, too, proved too hard for them. They labored on under constant ice falls and avalanches,

and reached a height of 10,300 feet, where they had perforce to halt. During these days, they saw some marvelous mountain scenery. Quote, the hold of the great cliffs of the Box Canyon appeared at first glance to be on fire, unnumbered thousands of tons of soft, snow were avalancheing from the southern flanks of Mount McKinley onto the glacier floor 5,000 feet below. The snow fell so far that it was broken into heavy clouds that rolled downward like heavy waves. The force of the rolling mass was terrific, and as it struck the blue, green glacier mail, it threw a great snow cloud that raced like a live thing for 500 feet. Whirling in the wind the avalanche had caused, the white wall swept across the valley, and almost before

we were aware of it, we were struggling and choking in a blinding and stinging cloud of ice dust. In quote. They began their retreat, and their return to greenery in summer out of a hyperborean hell was like a man's recovery from a dangerous illness. Though the expedition failed, they were a merry party, for though every man was sunken-eyed and lean and hatchet-faced, he was in the pink of condition. It was nothing to them to carry a load of 120 pounds, which would have broken their backs in the first days. The party included men of diverse temperaments and multifarious attainments, and Mr. Levoy observed, quote, it is an education to travel with a bunch like ours. If anything should happen, you can listen to a whole dictionary, end quote.

In the end, they came to their cash on Chulitna, and they emptied it as children empty their Christmas stockings. We were actually ravenous, said Mr. Belmore Brown, and as jars of chow-chow, cans of maple syrup, and tins of meat appeared, we hugged them in our arms and danced delirious dances on the sand. One of the great truths of life that one learns to understand in the north is that it is well worthwhile to go without the things one wants, for the greater the sacrifice, the greater the reward when the wish is consummated. I have eaten with all manner of hungry men from the sun-brown riders of the sage to the bedarkmen of the allusions, and I have feasted joyously on sill liver, seagull omelets, and caribou spinach, but never have I seen men eat more or better food.

End quote. As soon as the explorers returned to civilization, they began to plan a third attempt. It was clear to them that the western and southern faces of the mountain were impracticable, and that their best chance was on the northeast ridge. This, however, could not be approached from the south, so it became their object to get in on the north side. Their explorations in 1910 had proved the difficulties of a summer trip, for loads had to be transported on men's backs over many miles of glacier. They therefore decided to make a winter expedition of it, and to use Alaskan dog teams. The best route seemed to be up the Sucetna and Chulitna rivers, and they hope

somewhere near the head of the Chilitna to find a pass in the Alaskan range would take them round the north face of Mount McKinley. In October 1911, Mr. Lavoie began to relay supplies up to Chulitna, the plan being for him to join Professor Parker and Mr. Belmore Brown at Sucetna in February of 1912. As Cook Inlet is choked by ice during winter, the travelers had to leave the steamer at Sewerdard and make a long and difficult overland journey by way of Glacier City and the Canick Fjord to the Susitna River. There they found Mr. Levoy with the dog teams. He reported that he had taken the bulk of the outfit to a cache on the Chilitna several miles beyond the mouth of the Tokositna. The journey up to Sucitna, which was now a flat snow trail, went easily.

and pleasantly. When they reached the cash, they found to their disgust that a wolverine, which is the arch fiend of those northern wildernesses, had managed to break in, though it was placed for greater security on a platform of logs among the trees. The brute had destroyed a good deal of the dog feed and bacon, and a new and expensive camera of Mr. LaVois, which had been swung on the top of a 30-foot pole. The wolverine had climbed the pole, cut off the corners of the leather case and nod its way into the camera. From the cache began a long system of relays, for it was impossible to carry all the equipment in one journey.

There was now no trail, and a road had to be broken before each stage. The route lay up the Chilitna, and the travelers hoped to find some large stream coming down on their left, which would indicate a gap in the Alaskan range. Any such gap would, of course, be filled with glaciers, the water which must form a river. On the whole, winter traveling compared favorably with summer. The men used snow shoes to break the trail,

and after equipment had been transported for five miles, returned on the empty sleds for new loads. Winter had not killed all signs of wildlife, though hunting was difficult, and the snow was dotted with the tracks of innumerable wild things. Even a finch was heard singing. camping was perfectly comfortable and in a tent with a stove lit and beds of green spruce prepared the nights were warm and peaceful. At last the trees began to thin. They came to a point where the

valley split and a great canyon turned north toward the range. Travel now became rougher, for the broad level flats gave way to snow-covered rapids and big drifts. As they advanced up the gorge, a glacier was seen winding down from the center of the mountains. One night, Mr. Belmore Brown had an accident, which might have proved serious. He went out to shoot an owl for food, and as the ejector of his little rifle had been removed, the cartridge came back on his eye and just missed his right eyeball. It gave him an eerie feeling to see the friendly dogs lapping up the blood-stained snow. Shortly after, he made a reconnaissance of 25 miles ahead and found the glacier they had seen from afar off running like a great white road into the hills. The route seemed possible,

but there were ugly ice precipices at the head which suggested that the crossing of the pass might not be easy. A second reconnaissance took him to the head of the glacier. At first, no crossing could be discerned, but suddenly at the head of the right-hand. basin, the mountains broke away and he saw a smooth snowfield leading to the crest. He climbed to the top of it, and at first saw nothing but a sheer precipice. At length, however, he discovered on the right a gentle snow slope leading down into a great snow cup and realized that the pass could be crossed. On the 3rd of April, the main camp was pushed up to a height of 6,000 feet. Then came a delay from a blizzard, which confined the explorers for 24 hours to their tents. It was bitterly cold and

everything, including the alarm clock, froze stiff. They managed, however, to get a little fire with an empty pemmican case, and with a stove had a sort of party in the tent, men, dogs, and everything. The party was, however, unceremoniously broken up by one of the dogs backing into the stove and filling the tent with a cloud of smoke from singed air. Next morning they crossed the divide, partly shooting and partly lowering their belongings over the thousand feet drop into the hollow. They were no sooner across when another blizzard arrived and they were stormbound for 36 hours. But their spirits were high. For the time they were done with uphill climbs and they saw that by crossing a low pass at the head of another glacier,

they could reach the great Moldro Glacier, which had been known to the world since 1902. This glacier would take them into the very heart of the mountain. Without much difficulty they crossed the pass, and descending to the Moldro Marine, they realized with joy that they were on the northern side of the Alaskan Range. It was now nearly the middle of April, and they found themselves in the kind of country that hunters dream of. There was a chance of fresh meat, and to men who had been 17 days on the ice, the hope of a change in their menu and the sight of vegetation were in a nature. intoxication. Mr. Belmore Brown went out one morning and fell in with a herd of white sheep,

Olvis Daly. He secured three, and that night the camp feasted. In cold weather, he writes, one has a craving for fat, and in the wilderness one is less particular about the way meat is cooked. Our desire for fat was so intense that we tried eating the raw meat, and finding it good beyond words, we ate freely of the fresh mutton. I can easily understand now why savage tribes make a practice of eating uncooked flesh." The white sheep was not the only game. There was a special variety of caribou, there was the Alaskan moose, there was an occasional grizzly, and there were quantities of tarmigan. The travelers showed the most sportsman-like spirit in refraining from killing females or

immature beasts. From the Muldrow glacier they turned westward and struck the McKinley Fork of the Cantishna River, which flows to the Yukon. Presently, they were in timber country and realized that they had crossed the Alaskan range from wood to wood, and incidentally had added two new glacier systems to the map. After snow and ice and pemmican, they had greenery and fresh meat, and as they worked their way to the lowlands, the first flush of spring. Above all, they had the northeast ridges, of which there were three above them to offer an apparently possible route to the summit. They saw a glacier running between the central and northern northeast ridges,

which they decided would be their own. Mr. Belmore Brown went out to prospect, and climbing the head of a valley, found himself looking down upon the upper Moldrow Glacier, which he now realized was split in two by the central northeast ridge. He saw also that the northern branch of it gave a road to the very big, base of the central peak. A base camp was established on the 24th of April, and four days later began the chief reconnaissance. They took with them a dog team, and for equipment their mountain tent, instruments, alcohol lamps, and provisions of pemmican, chocolate, hard-tack, sugar, and raisins. The total outfit weighed about 600 pounds. They started at night when the snow was in better

condition and found the northern branch of the Moldro, which they called the McKinley Glacier, rising in steps like a huge staircase. Camp was pitched at the base of a serac between two great cliffs of solid blue ice. On the 3rd of May, they reached the top of the serac at an altitude of 8,500 feet after a very difficult journey. Mr. LaVoy, who was leading, fell into a crevasse, and the strain on the rope pulled Mr. Belmore Brown. to the very edge. Mr. LaVoy, however, stuck on a ledge of ice, which eased the strain. Without that ledge, it may well be that the whole expedition would have ended in tragedy. Bit by bit, they fought their way to the head of the glacier, suffering severely from the glare of the sun, though the

temperature was only one degree above freezing. They had now attained an altitude of 11,000 feet and saw a low coal on the mountain ridge where they decided to make a high camp. This would be about 12,000 feet high, which would leave them between 3,000 and 5,000 more feet to climb before they reached the basin between the north and south peaks. It was now time to send the dogs home, so after cashing their equipment, they started back for the base camp, which they reached on the evening of the 8th of May. Some pleasant days were spent at the base camp. When they left it, the countryside had still been in the grip of winter, but now everywhere there were grass and flowers and running streams. So far, they had managed well.

They had crossed the Alaskan range early enough to find the snow in good condition for dog sledding, and they had cashed 300 pounds weight of mountain provisions at 11,000 feet. They could, therefore, afford to wait till the days lengthened before venturing on a final climb. Here is Mr. Belmore Brown's picture of the landscape. Quote, The mountain country at the northern base of Mount McKinley is the most beautiful stretch of wilderness that I have ever seen, and I will never forget those wonderful days when I followed up the velvety valleys or clambered among the high rocky peaks as my

fancy led me. In the late evening, I have trotted downward through valleys that were so beautiful that I was forced against my will to lie down in the soft grass and drink in the wild beauty of the spot, though I knew I would be late for supper and that the stove would be cold. The mountains were bare of vegetation, with the exception of velvety carpets of green grass that swept downward from the snowfields. In the centers of the cup-shaped hollows ran streams of crystal clear water. As the sun sank lower and lower the hills would turn darker blue until the cold, clean air from the snowfields would remind you that night was come and that camp was far away." End quote.

The site of big avalanches on Mount McKinley warned the explorers that great risks had to be faced. On the 5th day of June, they started out for their final attack. Unfortunately, the weather became very bad, and soon they were enveloped in a heavy snowstorm. Mr. LaVoy had hurt his knee hunting, and the ascent through the Syrax was for him very arduous. The nervous strain, too, was great, for they had to be perpetually on the outlook for avalanches. They feared that one might have buried their cash, and it was an immense relief when they reached the 11,000 feet point and saw the top of their sleds sticking out of the snow. They now moved their supplies up to a camp on the call of the ridge at a height of 11,800 feet.

On the 19th of June they made a reconnaissance, taking with them food for six days and intending to climb up to the big basin between the two main peaks. They reached the height of 13,200 feet, up a sensational arie, when Mr. Levois' knee gave out, and they were compelled to return. Three days later, they made a camp on the ridge at 13,600 feet. It was a wild and most laborious journey with a drop of 5,000 feet on the left and 2,000 on the right. It would take them two hours of hard work to make 500 feet. Apart from the handicap of Mr. Le Bois' knee, Mr. Billmore Brown's eyes were very bad.

They now realized that they could not reach the summit with their food supply of six days' rations, and they were forced to change their plans and go back for more food. They returned to the camp on the call and packed up ten days rations. With tremendous difficulty, they transported them up to a 15,000-foot camp on the ridge where they were on the edge of the big glacier-filled basin between the two summits. All three found their health beginning to suffer. The pemmican proved to be impossible food, giving them all violent stomach pains, and they were forced to confine themselves to tea and hardtack.

The cold was intense, and inside the tent, with the alcohol stove burning in the warmth of three bodies, the temperature at 7.30 p.m. was 5 degrees below zero, and three hours later, 19 degrees below zero. Despite elaborate precautions, says Mr. Belmore Brown, I can say in all honesty that I did not have a single night's normal sleep above 15,000, feet on account of the cold." By this time, their appearance was, as Mr. LaVoy said, sufficient to frighten children into the straight and narrow path. All were more or less snow-blind, burnt black, unshavened,

with lips, noses, and hands swollen, cracked, and bleeding. On 27th June, the packs were carried in relays to just under the last Syrac, which was the highest point in the big basin. The altitude was 16,615 feet. Their one comfort was that a snowfield seemed to lead easily up to the skyline of the central northeast ridge, and that from there they saw what appeared to be a reasonable gradient to the final summit. On the 28th of June, they rested and prepared for their last effort. They were now convinced that nothing could stop them except storm.

The night was fine and the weather-prime. promised well for the morrow. The summit appeared to them to be nearly as flat with a slight hummocky rise which must be the highest point in North America. On the 29th of June, the left camp at 6 a.m., moving very quietly and steadily and conserving their strength. Mr. Levois and Mr. Belmore Brown led alternately. Slowly they made their way up the snow slopes at the rate of about 400 feet an hour. At 18,500, 500 feet, they stopped and congratulated each other, for they had beaten the Duke of a Bruzies record on Mount St. Ilius. Presently, they were on the skyline of the ridge, and looking down on the arena where they had

struggled two years before. Now, for the first time, came a threat from the weather. The sky was clear to the north, but from the south the great sea of clouds rolled against the mountain like surf on a shore. As they moved up the ridge, breathing became more difficult. At 19,000 feet, they had passed the last rock and were looking at the summit. It rose as innocently as a snow-covered tennis court, but now the wind was rising and the southern sky darkening, and just at the base to the last lift, the gale broke. In a fierce scurry of snow they crawled up the round dome, Mr. Levoy leading and hacking steps. Then came Mr. Belmore Brown's turn, and he realized that his hands were freezing,

and that the bitter wind was cutting through his flesh. He dare not get dry mittens from his rucksack lest his hand should be frozen during the change. When his second turn was three-fourths finished, Professor Parker's barometer registered 20,000 feet, and they were within 300 feet at the top. The rest was an evil dream. To each man, the other two seemed to be lost in the ice mist,

and the cold was freezing their marrow. The storm was growing fiercer, and as they topped a little rise, its full fury burst upon them. The story must be given in Mr. Bellamore Brown's own words. The breath was driven from my body, and I held to my axe with stooped shoulders to stand against the gale. I could not go ahead. As I brushed the frost from my glasses and squinted upward through the stinging snow, I saw a sight that will haunt me to my dying. day. The slope above me was no longer steep. That was all I could see. What it meant, I will never

know for certain. All I can say is that we were close to the top, end quote. There was no going on in the teeth of that gale. The three chopped a seat in the ice, trying to find shelter, but they were not huddled there a second before they discovered they were freezing. There was nothing for it but to return, for the snow was obliterating their back trail. Dead tired and sick at heart they began the journey back, and found that the steps they had cut had disappeared. It took them nearly two hours to go down an easy slope of a thousand feet. They reached the base of the dome, guiding themselves only by the direction of the wind, and at last at 7.35 p.m. crawled into their upper camp. All their apparel down to the

to their underclothes was filled with ice. They were beaten by the wind and by the wind only. On a conservative estimate, its pace was 55 miles an hour and the temperature 15 degrees below zero. Otherwise, they suffered little from the altitude. Mr. Belmore Brown was able to roll and smoke a cigarette between 18,000 and 19,000 feet. They spent a day in their tent trying to thaw their clothes.

Pemmican they could not touch. Their chocolate was finished, and their food was tea, sugar, hardtack, and raisins. It was a cruel fate that they had lost ten days rations in useless pemmican since leaving their 13,200 feet camp, and they had not only lost the food, but carried useless weight. They made one more attempt on the summit and reached the base of the final dome, but there another storm assailed them, and after waiting, an hour they went back. There was now a real risk of being caught with insufficient food in a blizzard which would destroy life, and they made haste down the mountain. They had spent seven days above 15,000 feet, six days above 16,000 feet, and four days above 16,650 feet. As they descended,

their health improved, and at last they came off the glacier onto the moraine and lay down on the bare earth. It was the first time for 30 days they had lain on anything but snow and ice. They slept like logs till the afternoon, and when they awoke, a warm wind was blowing up the pass, carrying with it the smell of grass and flowers. Never can I forget, says Mr. Belmore Brown, the flood of emotions that swept over me. Professor Parker and Levoy were equally affected by this first smell of the lowlands, and we were wet-eyed and chattered like children as we prepared our packs for the last stage of our journey. End quote.

How dangerous was the climatic condition of the mountain may be judged from what happened on the evening of 6th of July. From their camp in the foothills, they saw the sky suddenly turn a sickly green. There came a deep rumbling from the Alaskan range, and as they looked, the mountains melted into mist and the earth began to heave and roll. In front of them, a boulder weighing 200 pounds broke loose from the earth and moved. The surface of the hills seemed to open and the cracks to spout liquid mud. The whole range was wrapped in dust, and as it cleared they saw the peaks sprouting avalanches.

Had this earthquake overtaken them on the high ground, all must have perished. The story has always seemed to be one of the boldest and most patient adventures in the history of mountaineering. Slowly, the travelers fought their way to the discovery of the only practical route. Mount McKinley was conquered, though they had failed to cover the hundred or so feet which would have given them the actual summit. They had blazed the path to the top and solved its mysteries. Only that maleficent blizzard at the last moment robbed them of the full fruit of six years pioneering. Next year, the actual summit was reached. The late Dr. Hudson stuck the archdeacon of the Yukon, ever since he came to the country nine years before,

had contemplated an attempt on the mountain. In the autumn of 1912, he sent on supplies by way of the Cantica River to a point 50 miles from the base. In March, 1913, he and Mr. W. P. Carsten set out to reach the peak from the north. At their base camp, 4,000 feet up, they made a fresh supply of Caribou Pemmican, which proved more satisfactory than that used by Professor Parker and Mr. Belmore Brown. The road taken was the same as that of their predecessors, up the Muldrow Glacier, and then up the Central Northeast Ridge. They found that the earthquake of 1912 had completely changed the character of that ridge, and instead of being a reasonable snow gradient, it had become a confused mass of rock and ice most difficult to surmount. Bit by bit, they

forced their way up it till he reached the upper basin, and then, being favored with clear, bright still weather, they managed to attain the highest point, the southern summit. There had been a story of two miners called McGonagall and Anderson, who had reached the top in 1910. Dr. Stuck discovered that the top they had reached was the lesser northern peak, for he saw the remains of their flagstaff. With this ascent, the story of the conquest of Mount McKinley is complete. Footnote. Dr. Stuck argued with much reason that the present name of the mountain is unsuitable and that the Indian name, Donali, which means the great one, should be restored.

It is to be feared that the suggestion comes too late in the day. Ever since the expedition of 1906, Mount McKinley has become too familiar a name in the Western hemisphere to be readily changed for another. The story of the Parker Brown expedition is contained in the conquest of Mount McKinley, New York Putnam's 1913, and that of Dr. Stuck in the Ascent of Donally, New York Scribner's 1914. End of Chapter 6. Chapter 7 of The Last Secrets by John Buckin.

This Libra Box recording is in the public domain. Chapter 7. The Holy Cities of Islam The spell of Far Arabia has been a potent thing from the days when the Egyptians drew wealth from this spice land of punt, and Greek traders brought stories of the guns and jewels of Arabi the Blessed. But ever since it became the holy land of Islam, a veil of secrecy, other than that of its stern climate and inhospitable deserts, has descended upon it. It is one of the oldest of arenas of adventure, and it is still one of the least exploited. Indeed, in its great southern desert, it holds one of the few unriddled mysteries of the globe.

Except for the semi-mythical Gregorio, who may be read of in Albuquerque's commentaries, no one who did not profess the creed of Islam has entered its two holy cities and lived. But the greatest tale of Arabian exploration is not true. concerned with Mecca and Medina. It is to be found, rather, in the journeys of the English soldier Captain Sadlier in Nijit, of Sir Richard Burton in the land of Midian, of Wallen, who crossed the great Nafood Sands, of William Gifford Pahlgrave, who may or may not have been an agent of Napoleon III, and above all of Charles Montague Doty, who as an avowed Christian, explored the northern hijazz and in his Arabia deserta has written one of the foremost classics of travel

in the English tongue. Compared with some of these wanderings, a visit to the holy cities was a simple matter, requiring only a firm nerve, a good knowledge of Arabic and of Mohammedan ritual, and a real or professed adherence to the creed of Islam. At the beginning of this century, the list of Europeans who had entered Mecca and Medina was a long one. They were mostly renegades, French, English, Irish, Scottish, and Italian. In 1807, a certain Domingo Badae Ilebelich of Cadiz, traveling as a Muslim prince called Alibe, and probably in the pay of Napoleon, entered Mecca in state. But he had become a genuine musselman. In 1815, one Thomas Keith, a dessert, a desert from the 72nd Highlanders was governor of Medina, surely one of the strangest posts ever held

even by a Scot. The great European travelers like Burkhart, Wallen, and Burton went to the holy cities in order that by attaining the rank and fame of a hajee, they might win an advantage for traveling in other Muslim lands. More than one of them has described minutely the interior of both Mecca and Medina and the ritual of the great ceremonies. The holy places, though few Western eyes have seen them, were sufficiently well known to the Western world. Their true unveiling may be said to have come about during the Great War when Hassan, the sheriff of Mecca, fought as an ally with the British,

and as King of the Hedjas, proclaimed his independence of Turkey. Yet one journey was taken just before the Great War, which must rank by itself. It told the world nothing that was not known before, but it had the merit of giving a picture of Mecca and Medina under the latest conditions, a picture drawn with such vigor and in such detail that it may fairly claim to have revealed the holy cities in a new light to the ordinary man. Mr. A. J. B. Wavel greatly distinguish himself in command of Arab scouts in East Africa in the early part of the Great War, and was responsible for the brilliant affair at Ghazi. In that campaign, he gave his life for his country. He had been at Winchester, and in 1908,

when he made the plan for visiting Mecca, had been living for some time at Mombasa, where he had acquired Arabic and Swahili and a considerable knowledge of Muslim customs. His motive was partly curiosity, partly as he had acquired Arabic and Swahili, and a considerable knowledge of Muslim customs. His motive was partly curiosity, partly, as he says, to accustom himself to Arab ways with a view to further explorations in Arabia, and partly in order to obtain the useful prestige of Ahanji. He chose, as his companions, a certain Abdul Wahid, an Arab from Aleppo, who was established in Berlin, and Masaudi, a Mombasa native. The three met at Marseilles on September 23rd, 1908. They started in good time, for though the pilgrimage was not to take place

till the beginning of the following January, Mr. Wevel wanted to go first to Medina and also to prepare himself by a preliminary discipline in Eastern life. He managed to secure a Turkish passport, which described him as one Ali bin Mohammed, age 25, a subject of Zanzibar on his way to Mecca. The three found a vessel at Genoa,

which took them to Alexandria, where they managed, not without trouble, to get their medicine chest, pistols, and ammunition past the customs. They then took passages on a cadaver mail ship for Beirut. Mr. Wevel had feared that the language difficulty would be serious, but he found it less formidable than expected, since the dialects of Arabic are many. He explained to those who found imperfections in his accent, that in Zanzibar, the colloquial language was Swahili and that no one talked Arabic. And on the few occasions when he had to speak Swahili, he inverted the story announcing that, having been born in Muscat, his real language was Arabic.

As Sir Richard Burton discovered in his own journey, it was rare indeed to find anyone sufficiently well acquainted with both languages to find him out. meantime he had changed at Alexandria into Arab clothes and shaved his head. They reached Beirut safely and proceeded at once by rail to Damascus. As they did not propose to start from Medina for some weeks, they took rooms and settled down, devoting great attention to the various Muslim ceremonies and picking up the right kind of phrases and quotations and greetings. It is on such small things that the efficacy of the,

of a disguise depends. There are nearly as many white men at Mecca, Mr. Webel writes in his account of his adventures, as there are men black or brown in color. Syrian Arabs not infrequently have fair hair and blue eyes, as likewise have some of the natives of the holy cities themselves. I was once asked, what color I stained myself for this journey?

The question reveals the curious ignorance that lies, at the bottom of the so-called race prejudice, of which some people are so proud. You might as well black yourself all over to play Hamlet, end quote. Abdul Waheed had brought letters of introduction to a local merchant, who was most hospitable and supervised the preparations for the journey. They passed safely through the period of Ramadan, and so complete was Mr. Wevel's get-up, and so stalwart his Muslim respectability,

that it was with some difficulty that he prevented a middle-aged lady and her two daughters from joining his party for the pilgrimage. He bought the Iram, the white robes which are required when entering Mecca, a full camp equipment, and a certain number of stores, and deposited his money with his merchant friend who gave him two checks on his agents, one at Medina and one at Mecca. He proposed to travel to Medina by the Head Jazz Railway, a very different method. from those used by earlier adventurers when aiming at Mecca. The third-class carriages were desperately crowded, and the train started to the accompaniment of gramophones,

a modern invention which is very popular in the Ajax. On the way, Mr. Wevel had a touch of malaria, and his fellow pilgrims showed him every kindness. Presently, the train reached Medan Sala, the boundary of the Hejaz, which no infidel is permitted to pass. On the fourth day, the rocky hills opened and through a gap appeared the minarets of the Prophet's Mosque. They arrived at Medina in the middle of a battle for the Turkish garrison had come to loggerheads with a neighboring Bedouin, and the Holy City was more or less in a state of siege.

The railway was spoiling trade for the neighboring tribes, and they were demanding compensation, which Constantinople would not pay. Medina lies in an open plain some 3,000 feet above sea level. To the south, the country is open, but on the north and west, between five and ten miles distant, rise rocky mountains. The city, which has a population of some 30,000, lives entirely on the pilgrims, just as an English watering place lives on summer visitors. The pilgrims are classified by their lands of origin, and there are official guides called Mutoafs attached to each group. The first trouble arose from these guides. If Mr. Wevel went about with the Zanzibar Matoffs, he was certain to meet someone who knew him in Mombasa,

even if he were not caught out in the language. So it was arranged that Abdul Wahid should profess to come from Baghdad while Mr. Wevel passed as a derwish and Masaudi as his slave. A derwish, a derwish, a Derwish, which denotes properly a member of a certain monastic order, is a title occasionally assumed by pilgrims who do not wish to be identified with any particular nationality. Happily, at the station, there were no Zanzibar guides, and the party were able to find rooms in a retired corner at the moderate rate of two pounds a month. The landlord was an Abyssinian called Eman, a man of some private means, who had been captured as a child by Arab slavers and sold in Mecca. He proved a most useful friend to the party

during their stay. So began a curious life of endless religious observations. Apart from the sacred places, which few European eyes had beheld, there was a perpetual interest in the study of the pilgrims. A large caravan came in from Yambu bringing crowds of Indians, Javanese, and Chinamen. Every eastern race might be identified in the motley crowd, and every variety of costume, till the whole resembled nothing so much as a fancy dress ball. In the same line of prayer stand European Turks with their frock coats and stick-up collars, Anatolians with enormous trousers and fantastic weapons, Arabs from the West, who look as if they were a raid for burial, the Bedou, or Bedou with their spears and cemeteres,

and Indians, who, in spite of there being the richest class there, managed, as usual, to look the most unkempt and the least clean. Then besides, were the Persians, Chinese, Javanese, Japanese, Malayans, a dozen different African races, Egyptians, Afghans, Baluchis, Swahili, and Arabs of every description, in quote. Representatives of half the races of the globe may be picked out in the mosque any day during the month before the pilgrimage. The behavior of the pilgrims, who now saw with their own eyes the tomb of the prophet, which from their childhood they had been taught to regard with awe, was a proof of the living reality of the Islamic faith. Quote, many burst into tears and frantically kissed the railings.

I have seen Indians and Afghans fall down apparently unconscious. They seem to be much more affected here than before the Kaaba itself. At Mecca, the feeling is of awe and reverence. Here the personal element comes in. The onlooker might fancy that they were visiting the tomb of some dear friend, one whom they had actually known and been intimate with in his life. lifetime. With frantic interest, they listened to their guides as they describe the surroundings. Here is the place where the prophet prayed, the pulpit he preached from, the pillar against which

he leaned. There, looking to the mosque, is the window of Abu Bakr's house, where for long he stayed as a guest, and beyond is the little garden planted by his daughter Fatima. end quote. Moreover, there is no suggestion of infidel authority. The Muslim standard floats over the town, Muslim cannon protected skates, and no unbeliever may enter. But there are startling touches of modernity. In the shops, she may buy European tin goods and note advertisements of Cadbury's chocolates and Huntley and Palmer's biscuits. The party had brought introductions from Damascus, and and Abdul Waheed had made various friends, so they saw a good deal of society.

The time was just after the rising of the young Turks and the grant to the Constitution. Mr. Wevel, who was a staunch Tory, found to his disgust that everyone talked parliamentarianism and liberal principles. England and the English were everywhere in high favor because of our attitude in this recent quarrel with Austria over the annexation of Bosnia.

quote, I am afraid I managed to give the impression that Zanzibar is a sadly backward state, or that I myself am peculiarly stupid. Not to know a word of any European language is to be held very ignorant, even in Medina. Most people of the class whom I associated had at any rate a smattering of French, and sometimes of English too. I was careful never to know anything, end quote. Their stay in Medina was much enlivened by the Bedouin siege. Mr. Wevel tried to get enlisted in the defense force,

and when that plan failed, succeeded in getting into a very warm corner just outside the gates. They visited, like, industrious tourists, every possible place of interest, and few pilgrims could have spent a more enlightening three weeks. During the whole time, they were never in real danger. They had, indeed, a scuffle with a Persian Matov, who would, insist that Mr. Wevel was a Persian. But by vigorous bluffing, they made him apologize and afterwards employed him as a guide. Once only was there a hint of trouble. Mousuti, standing in the mosque one day before the noonday prayer, found himself face to face with five Mombasa Swahilies who knew him intimately,

and what was worse, knew Mr. Wavel. Masaudi showed remarkable gifts of mendacity. He said that he had left Mr. Wevel in England, and having saved a little money, thought the present was a good time to perform the pilgrimage. He was in Medina, he said, as a servant of some rich Egyptian pilgrims. As he walked back after prayer, he dropped his string of beads. The Swahili's asked where his house was, and he promised to show it to them. But halfway up the street, he suddenly remembered the beads, bolted back, and lost himself in the crowd. The incident convinced Mr. Wevel that he had better start without delay from

Mecca. Their plan was to go to the coast at Yembu, for which a caravan was starting at once. They arranged for three camels, one to carry a chugduf, which is a cross between a panier and a haouda, and the other two for luggage, and they brought the necessary food. They took with them a Persian called Jaffa as a cook and his brother Ibrahim as a general servant. The luggage was carried down to the big square where the caravan was parked and where the travelers had to pass the night.

That evening there occurred an untoward event. Mr. Wevel was going to a shop for some small purchase when he met two Mattoofs who demanded to Noah's nationality. The Matoafs, being a strict trades union, were convinced that he was defrauding the brotherhood. He took a high line and showed his pistol, and, fortunately, his late landlord came down the street at the moment and took his side. What might have been an ugly experience ended in a minor street brawl. The journey to Yembu was little better than a nightmare.

The fashionable road from Medina to Mecca is overland, or back to Damascus and so direct to Jida by the Suez Canal. Only poor people go by the Yimbu route, which is supposed to be the most hazardous and the roughest in the Hedjas. There were no escort or police arrangements, no daily market, and each traveler had to carry his own provisions in water. The Bedouin hired out the camels, which numbered about 5,000, and a Badawi sheikh was in charge. The countryside was infested by robbers who constantly cut off stragglers. The ground, too was difficult going, being a rough mountain land, and while the noons were scorching, the nights were bitterly cold. Every night an encampment was made, roughly circular in shape,

into which the whole caravan was packed in the smallest possible space. Quote, while I was trying to get warm, a man stumbled against me and nearly knocked me into the fire. Turning around, I was shocked to see a figure, stained almost from head to foot with blood from a tremendous gait. ash in the head, obviously a sword cut. He asked for water, and I went into the tent to get him some, but returning found him gone. We heard the next day that no less than six men had been murdered that night, and many others wounded. And so it went on until we reached Yembu. These unfortunates were

mostly people who could not afford camels, and so had to perform the journey on foot. Straying from the main body in search of firewood, they got peasanties. picked up by the marauders hanging on the flanks, who seized every opportunity to plunder such stragglers of their miserable possessions, and killed unhesitatingly anyone who resisted. It was in this country that Charles Doty spent part of his time, and Mr. Wovell thinks that one reason of his success was that he carried nothing worth stealing. The fact that Doty denied neither his religion nor his nationalities seemed to him not the most remarkable fact about the achievement. Quote, the Bedou themselves are not fanatical on these points, and he did not attempt to enter the

forbidden cities. Of course, the fact of a stranger being a Christian is always a good excuse for knocking him on the head, but failing it, they will soon find another if they want to do so, and will be quite uninfluenced by it if they don't, end quote. They had one role with their camelman, Saad, who tried to extort back sheesh. Suddenly, he quieted down and became all politeness to the end of the journey. The reason for this was that the resourceful liar Ibrahim had told him that Mr. Wevel was a nephew of the governor of Yembu. This story served the travelers well.

It spread through the caravan and many of the pilgrims who were being black meal by their camelmen, came to him and begged his protection and received it. At last on the dawn of the sixth day, after trekking without a stop for the last 20 hours, they reached the gates of Yembu. Here they were delayed some time, owing to the fact that the pilgrim ship to take them to Jetta, an old Greek vessel chartered by a syndicate of Persians, would not start till its owners considered that sufficient pilgrims had arrived. Abdul Waheed now became the popular leader. At the head of a mob of passengers, he seized the Persians and carried them off to the governor. Mounded on a pile of sugar bags, he delivered an

impassioned address, concluding with, quote, we had better be dealing with Christians than Muslims who cheat their brethren in this fashion, end quote. Murmurs of protest, says Mr. Weville, deprecated this revolt in comparison. We all thought he was. going a little too far." The Persians finally capitulated and the ship got underway. But there came one last contretem. A party of Mugribi Arabs had passed a quarantine and were halfway out to the ship when one of them died. The shore authorities refused to let them land again, and the Persians declined to take the corpse aboard. The Arabs could not throw it into the sea because there were certain ceremonial washings to be performed and certain prayers to be said.

An Egyptian lawyer on board gave it as his opinion that the man, having taken his ticket, was entitled to his passage, dead or alive, there being no saving clause in the contract. Finally, the Meghribis got sick of arguing, swarmed over the bulwarks, and hoisted up their departed comrade. Their fierce faces and long knives settled the point of law. At half-past four in the afternoon, the siren blew to announce that the pilgrims were within that latitude where they must exchange their ordinary clothes for the iram, the garb which has to be worn by all travelers who attain a certain distance from Mecca. The costume consists of two white bath towels, one worn round the loins and the other over the shoulders. The head is unprotected, but deaths from sunstroke are singularly few. The costume is not becoming, especially in the case of a fat man.

A party of elderly European Turks close to us looked peculiarly ludicrous, their appearance suggesting members of the Athenian club suddenly evicted from a Turkish bath, end quote. The party remained four days at Jetta, visiting, among other places, the tomb of Eve, who apparently was about a quarter of a mile in height, so it was a time. and heath, so it was a tiring business to make the necessary perambulation of her sepulchre. Owing to their behavior at Yembu, they had acquired much kudos among the pilgrims and had no difficulties during their stay. The only anxiety was about the Mombasa Swahili's, and also about a

certain Mombasa sheikh who knew Mr. Wevel and was proposing to go to Mecca that year. As neither Sheik nor Swahili's arrived, they decided to risk it to be. and go on to Mecca after Mr. Weavelle had left the letter for the Sheik requesting him to hold his tongue. They found the Mutouaf, who was a local agent of one of the principal Mecca guides, to whom he wrote recommending them. They never intended to employ this guide, but the recommendation gave them an excuse to refuse to employ others. Having taken every precaution they could think of, they prepared for the last stage of the journey. quote, Abdul Waheed made a vow that if he returned safely he would present three dollars to the poor of Jeddah. We told him we thought he was asking the Almighty to do it for too cheaply and that he had much better make it a sovereign.

To our disgust, when he did get back, he utterly declined to disgorge the promised sum, end quote. The journey from Jetta to Mecca can be performed in a day, for it is only some for, it is only some 40 miles. The road is protected by a line of blockhouses. Every mile or so, there is a restaurant or a booth for refreshment, and all day long during the pilgrimage season there is a continuous caravan. A strange silence broods over everything. There is no shouting or singing or firing of guns, and the camels move over the deep, soft sand with scarcely a sound, for to the Moslem, it is the approach to the Holy of Holies. Quote, to him, it is a place

hardly belonging to this world, overshadowed like the tabernacle of old by the almost tangible presence of the deity. Five times daily throughout his life has he turned his face toward the city, whose mysteries he is now about to view with his own eyes.

Moreover, according to the common belief, pilgrimage brings certain responsibilities and even perils with its manifold blessings. Good deeds in Mecca count many thousand times their value elsewhere, but sin that is committed there will reap its reward in hell, end quote. Mr. Wilbel and his companions,

decently but simply clad in their bath towels, approached the city repeating the ceremonial prayers, to one which began, O Lord, who hast brought me in safety to this place, do thou bring me safely out again, He said a fervid, Amen. Mecca lies in a deep-cut hollow of the hills and is not visible till travelers are at its gates. Presently they found themselves in the great square which contains the kaba, the black covering of which is in startling contrast with a dazzling white marble of the pavement.

The kaba itself is a cube about 40 feet square, built of granite blocks, and led into the wall as a great black stone. This stone is believed to have fallen from heaven, which it probably did as it is clearly a meteorite. Bare-footed, the little party moved round it their requisite seven times chanting the proper prayers. Then a small circular patch of hair was shaved from their heads, and the first part of the ceremony was over. Mecca was then under the semi-independent rule of Sheriff Hassan, and on the whole, seemed to be well governed. But the problems of the municipal authorities and looking after the vast crowd of pilgrims was no easy one. As at Medina, every race on earth was represented there. Mr. Wevel was most struck by the Javanese, who were present in great numbers,

for there was then a strong Islamic revival in the Far East. The party found comfortable lodgings in a quiet street, and as at Medina, went much into society owing to the wide acquaintance of Abdul Vahid. Mecca is one of the few places remaining where there is an open slave market, and female slaves may be bought for prices ranging from 20 pounds to 100 pounds, though Georgians and Circassians fetch more. Masadi discovered an acquaintance in a boy called Kepi from Mbasa, whose father had died on the pilgrimage and was now left destitute.

Kepi was accordingly attached to the party. Mr. Wevel heard the good news that the Mombasa sheikh, whose coming he had been warned of, had now written saying that he would not arrive that year. The time passed pleasantly in sightseeing and giving and receiving hospitality. Mr. Weavell gave one dinner to no less than 12 guests, which, since he had an excellent cook, was very successful. There are a few more curious incidents,

in the literature of travel, that this party, given by a disguised Christian and the Muslim Holy of Holies, to a company which included Arabs from Bussarah and Mecca, two Persian merchants, and a Turkish officer from the Baghdad Corps.

Most Western luxuries can be obtained in Mecca, including ice cream, which, according to Mr. Wevel, is a frozen mixture of tin milk, dirty water, and cholera germs. Alcoholic liquor can also be got if you know where to go for it. The great festival was now approaching. A white linen band

was fastened round the black covering of the Kaaba, which remained there till the great day when that covering was changed. A new covering is brought every year from Egypt, made of dull black silk and cotton embroidered with a name of God on every square foot. It is prepared in Constantinople and is said to cost 3,600 pounds. The main ceremony of the festival is as follows. On a certain fixed day, all adults must leave the city before nightfall and go to a village called Mina,

some five miles to the north. They pass the night there and go nine miles farther on the next morning to Mount Arafat, where they remain till sunset. They then return and sleep at Nimrah halfway between Arafat and Mina, The third day they must be back at Nina in the morning, go through the ceremony of throwing stones at the three devils, proceed to Mecca for other ceremonies, and return to Meena for the night.

The fourth day is spent at Mina, and at noon on the fifth day they return to Mecca. The bath towels of Iram are now relinquished, and the pilgrim dons the best new clothes which he can afford. He is then entitled to the name of Haji, and thereafter, throughout life, can wear a special headgear, such as a green turban. The exodus from the city to Mina was a strange sight. The different holy carpets were escorted by regiments and brass bands, that of Egypt, marching to the tune of barren rocks of Aden. Sheriff Hudson was there on horseback,

accompanied by a crowd of spearmen and a squadron of racing camels. The ride to Mina beggared description. The best idea of what it is, dislike, Mr. Willvel wrote, will be gained by considering that at least half a million people are traversing these nine miles of road between sunrise and ten o'clock this day, that about half of them are mounted, and that many of them possess baggage animals as well. The roar of this great column is like a breaking sea, and the dust spreads from miles over the surrounding country. When, passing through the second defile, we came inside of Arafat itself, the spectacle was short.

stranger still. The hill was literally black with people, and tents were springing up around it, hundreds to the minute, in an ever-widening circle. As we approached, dull murmur caused by thousands of people shouting the formula, Lebeca, Lebeca, al-a-homa-lebeca, which had long been audible, became so loud that it dominated every other sound. In the distance, it sounded rather ominous, suggestive of some deep disturbance of great power, like the rumble of an earthquake, end quote. The hygienic conditions of the Exodus were, of course, abominable. Tanks and springs were soon fouled by people bathing in them, and the condition of the hillside was filthy beyond description. Often, some infectious disease like cholera decimates the pilgrims,

but our travelers were fortunate in escaping it. They went through all the proper ceremonies and stoned the three devils at Mina with gusto. The three devils are three stone pillars, and in a mob of many thousands of bad shots, a good many pilgrims are bound to suffer. They bought a sheep to sacrifice like the others, and a mess of oafel and blood was soon added to the attractions of the countryside. They then went back to Mecca, kissed the black stone,

had another square inch of hair shaved from their temples, and were free to put off the bath towels. Now was the moment for the new clothes. Abdul Waheed appeared in a bilious yellow garment brought from Damascus, Masoudi in an obsolete regimental mess waistcoat, while Mr. Wevel was chastly arrayed in white cloth robes, a black jubba, and a gold sash with a dagger. Thus attired, they sat out again for Mina for the last ceremonies.

In the night a thief got into their tent and carried off Masaldi's new turban, $5 in gold, various oddments, including a couple of pistols. In the morning they went to salute the sheriff, and when they had returned and were sitting in their tent, passed through the most dangerous moment of the adventure. The wall of the tent was down, as is usual in the heat of the day, and they were squatting on the carpet, when suddenly they heard an exclamation from Masaui.

looking around they saw standing within a few feet of them and looking straight into the tent three of the Mombasa Swahilies whom they had met at Medina. It scarcely seemed possible that they could miss seeing Masudi, and if they did they would certainly come into the tent to greet him when Mr. Weavelle was bound to be recognized. The morning sun, however, was shining right in their eyes, so they saw nothing and passed on. As soon as they had turned their backs, Mr. Weavell and Masse was. Sudi ran out of the tent on the other side and mingled with the crowd. They returned to Mecca to be congratulated by their friends on the successful

accomplishment of the pilgrimage, and Mr. Ovel was free to go into the world as Haji Ali bin Mohammed. It was now their business to get out of Mecca as soon as possible, especially as money was running low. They paid the necessary farewell visits, hired the transport, and started intending to do the journey in one day. They were, however, held up by a sentry on the road and had to spend a cold and comfortless night in the open. It did not enter Jidda till sunrise. At Jada, they separated. Masaudi went to Mombasa, Abdul Wahid to Persia, and Mr. Wevel to Egypt. In summing up the expedition, Mr. Wovell was disposed to attribute his success not to any histrionic gifts of his own, but to the ignorance of the inhabitants of the holy cities and their

lack of interest in the outside world, even the Islamic world. Quote, there are so many different sects in Islam, and its adherents are found in so many different countries, that I seriously believe that if someone invented for himself a country and a language that did not exist at all, and journeyed thus to Mecca, no one there would know enough geography to find him out. Yet, with all, they are quick enough in their way, and if some Matov would take the trouble to write a book on ethnography and its relation to Islam of the day, and classify the different races that come to Mecca, such a deception as I practiced would become impossible, end quote. They did, as a matter of fact, excite a certain suspicion, and their two servants,

though they were Persians and new little Arabic, must have had their own views. The great assets of the travelers were their knowledge of Arabic and Muslim ceremonial, and the fact that Mr. Wevel took up his disguise long before he approached the hijazz. He considered that Medina was much the more dangerous place of the two, and that no traveler should go there who was not thoroughly at home in his Oriental character. Whatever may be said, the journey is one of extreme danger in delicacy, and demands not only great knowledge but perpetual vigilance. It must be remembered that the European is all the time in the midst of a fanatical and devout people, and that the highest merit would be acquired by anyone who might discover and denounce the unbeliever. In spite of every

precaution, there must be an enormous element of luck, and Mr. Wevel's conclusion is that his escape was due rather to a series of happy chances than to his own good management. End of Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Of the Last Secrets by John Buckin This Liverbox recording is in the public domain Chapter 8 The Exploration of New Guinea

Almost every part of the globe has suffered some change in the past century It may have altered its appearance by settlement and cultivation and the growth of cities or if it still remains a wilderness, there are roots of commerce through it which bring it to the knowledge of the world. But the great island of New Guinea is almost as little changed today by the advent of white adventurers, as when in the year 1527 Jorge de Meneses, the Portuguese governor of the spice islands, first landed on its swampy shores. In 1545, 18 years later,

It received the name by which it is known today. The Portuguese empire decayed, and during the 17th century, the Dutch appeared. In the 18th century, many famous voyagers like Dampier, Carteret, and Captain Cook touched the island, and in the last century, the rapid opening up of the world by travelers and missionaries bore fruit even in those remote seas. The Dutch held the Western End, in 1884. Germany laid claim to the northeastern part, and that same year the southeastern section, which had been formally taken over in 1883 by Queensland, was annexed to the British Crown.

In 1890, the Dutch boundary was delimited, and Holland, with the ascent of the powers, assumed direct control of her share. The one changed today in these arrangements is that the former German section is now administered under mandate by the Commonwealth of Australia. The first decade of this century saw great exploring activity on the part of all three European masters. The Dutch, especially, did excellent work, and Dr. Lawrence was the first man to reach the snows of the inland mountains. But few of the secrets of the island, geographical, zoological, and botanical, have yet been unriddled. The place is so remote from Europe, Its climate is so deadly, its inhabitants so treacherous, and its forests and swamp so impenetrable,

that exploration there is in many ways a more desperate undertaking than anywhere else on the globe. I have selected two expeditions as an example of what the pioneer must undergo. In 1910, the ornithologists union set out an expedition to investigate the new Kinney Fana and collect specimens. Captain Cecil Rowling, whose thirst for the unknown was unquenchable, accompanied it on the geographical side, and Mr. A.F.R. Walliston as medical officer. There was no proper survey equipment, as the mission was primarily one of naturalists. Ten Gurkhas were enlisted from India, and the Dutch government supplied a certain number of Javanese troops. Coolies also were recruited in Java, who turned out to be hopelessly unsuitable,

both in physique and character for any serious travel in the wilds. The majority were about 16 years of age, and they appeared in the jungle decently dressed in black frock coats and bowler hats. The part selected was the southern coast of the Dutch territory, and it was Captain Rawlings' hope that they would be able to penetrate to that belt of snow mountains at the head of the coastal rivers, running from the Nassau Range in the west to Villalmina Peak in the east, where Dr. Lawrence had been the pioneer.

Obviously, it was vital to find a river which would take them direct to the hills, but they had no previous information to go upon, and were compelled to select their stream at random. Had they gone farther east and chosen the Utaqua, they would have found a current navigable for an ocean-going steamer for 17 miles from its mouth, and for launches for many miles more. A river, moreover, running directly from the highest snows of Mount Carstons. As it was, they hit upon a river called the Mamika,

a small, jungle-fed stream rising in the low foothills 60 miles to the west of Carstons, and 20 miles or so short of the main range. The Mamika, too, was full of endless windings and liable to sudden and violent floodings. Hence it was of little use to the expedition in the way of transport. This was the more regrettable since transport was the essence of the problem. From the foothills of the mountains to the sea lies a belt of forest like a barbed wire entanglement.

This forest is so dense that the cutting of a road can only progress at the rate of a hundred yards a day. It is swampy and often in flood time underwater and filled with every form of noxious incest. life. Unless this nightmare land can be circumvented by the use of a broad river channel, it must take even a strong party many months before they reach the base of the hills. This was what happened to Captain Rawling. On January 26, 1910, after a base camp had been established at Wakatimi, not far from the Mamika mouth, he set off to ascend the river. Here is his description of the country. Quote,

it is quite impossible for anyone who has not visited these parts of New Guinea to realize the density of the forest growth. The vegetation, through which only the scantiest glimpses of the sky can be obtained, appears to form, as it were, two great horizontal strata. The first comprises the giant's trees whose topmost boughs are 150 feet or more above the ground. The other, the bushes, shrubs, and trees of lesser growth, which never attain a greater height than 30 to 40 feet.

Such is the richness of the soil that not one square foot remains untenanted, and the never-ending struggle to reach upwards towards the long-for-light goes on silently and relentlessly. Creepers and parasites and endless variety cling to every stem, slowly but surely throttling their hosts. From tree to tree, their tentacles stretch out, seizing onto the first projecting branch and limb, and forming such a close and tangled mass that the dead and dying giants of the forest are prevented from falling to the ground. The various devices recommended in the books of one's childhood, and it may be added in learned books as well,

whereby the traveler is enabled to recover a lost trail or regain the right direction, are here of no avail. instance, moss does not grow more on one side of a tree trunk than on the other. Trees do not lean away from the prevailing wind, nor is the position of the sun a guide, for it is seldom visible. In fact, the traveler has nothing to rely upon but the compass or a local guide, and even the latter is often at fault. Hopeless indeed does the outlook appear when the wanderer, hedged in by a wall of scrub and creeper which limits his vision to a distance of 10 or 12 yards, realizes that he has lost his bearings. When the vastness of the forest seems to press upon him, and there is no sound to be heard but the drip of the water-laden trees and the bubbling of the stinking bog underfoot.

His only chance of escape is to find a stream and follow it down till it joins a main river. end quote. The first big episode was the discovery of the pygmies who lived in the foothills and were assiduously hunted by the forest tribes. The average height of these little men was four feet seven inches, and Captain Rawling penetrated to their village in a clearing above the headwaters of the Mamika. The Mamika source was reached but led them nowhere, and they fared no better with another small stream to the west called the Kapari. Then, by accident, a secret native path was discovered running eastward, a mere tunnel in the matted forest. By this route, they were able to reach a parallel river called a Tuaba, which was a tributary of the larger Kamura. From a village called Ibo as a center,

the expedition made various casts east and north, but found it impossible to get near the skirts of the hills. Captain Rawling returned to the coast and made excursions along the eastern shore, but found no adjacent river mouth which promised better. By this time it was June and the floods began with such vigor that practically the whole country between the mountains and the sea was underwater. When the floods ebbed, a resolute attempt was made to push east from Ibo, and with a good deal of trouble, another parallel stream was reached called the Wataiqua. The party founded a camp there and explored the upper waters of that stream.

Traveling was extremely difficult because the only decent road was the riverbed, and this route was promptly made impossible by a new spate. The travelers had to face the fact that the farther they went eastward, the greater became the labor of carrying supplies, for their base camp remained on the Mamika. Still, an effort must be made unless the expedition was to admit failure. It was decided that the best plan was to try and cut a road through the forest to the next stream on the east, in the hope that it would lead them into the hills.

This was done, and the Iwaka River was reached after much severe toil. They had entered a desperate country strewn with moss-covered boulders and seamed with gullies covered with an impenetrable mass of timber. The density of this growth was unbelievable. Through it, no man could force away unless with an axe in hand, and as most of the trees were of a very hard wood, the stems varying from four to eight inches in diameter, and clothed from top to bottom with damp earth covered with moss, progress at times became impossible. An idea of the labor involved in the task of clearing a two-foot path through this forest may be judged by, the fact that a stretch of 5,000 yards required three weeks constant work before a man could pass

freely along. On one day, two cutters achieved a length of 210 yards, and on another, when Captain Rowling was working by himself, all he could add was a piece of 90 yards in length. No wonder, he asks, quote, can this forest, with its horrible monotony and impregnability be equaled by any other in the world." Down came the rain again, and in August the country was all underwater. The advance was not renewed till the beginning of 1911 when fresh supplies had arrived from England, and the old motorboat had been put in repair. So far, a year's hard labor had not taken the explorers within measurable distance of their

goal. With the help of a launch, food supplies for eight weeks were stored at the head of the Mamika. One story may be quoted as a piece of comic relief in a very grim campaign. On the 4th of January, two men quarreled in camp and killed each other. Quote, the sergeant, who by the way was a foreigner, took charge of the burial ceremonials, and was evidently quite determined that, for his part, nothing should be lacking which the importance of the occasion demanded. drawing his sword and placing himself between the graves, he arraigned the spectators.

Men, he said, this day two servants of the government have lost their lives at the hands of each other. Were they not both good men, hein? One man, very bad man, chipped in an officious convict, but a glance from the offended sergeant made him wish that he had never spoken. Whether they will both go to heaven I cannot say, exclaimed he, but I think Allah, pointing upward with his sword, will first purge them with a fire. Take this as a lesson.

Then, drawing himself up to his full height as befitted the occasion, he returned his sword with a clink to the scabbard, and as far as the public was concerned, the ceremony was at an end. The sergeant, however, had not yet finished. Returning to his hut, he refreshed himself with a few glasses of gin, and played on the mouth organ the national anthems of the three flags under which he had served.

This terminated the funeral obsequies, and with the exception of the official report and the entry in the accounts to one model gin for disinfecting corpse, nothing remained to mark the sanguinary affair. The Iwaka was safely reached, and the last stage began. At first, the advance was uppercule, its right bank, but this only brought the travelers back to the upper glen of the Wataiqua, which they had already found impossible. It was clear that the Iwaka must be crossed, and the ridges to the east ascended. Getting over that stream was an ugly business,

and it was achieved only by the heroism of one of the Gurkhas, who managed to haul himself hand over hand along a thin rope. Captain Rawling records that it was, quote, one of the best actions carried out in cold blood that I have ever had the good fortune to witness, end quote. A rough bridge was constructed, and on the morning of February 8, 1911, 13 months after their first landing on the coast, the party had at last a road to the upper ridges. It was thick, misty weather, and of the farther mountains they had only an occasional glimpse. Camp was pitched at an altitude of 5,400 feet, but not on solid ground, for all the climbing had been done to the top of live or dead timber. The following morning, they hacked their way to a clear space on the ridge at a height of

5,600 feet, and there they were at last favored with a view for which they had longed, and were able to fix the position of the main peaks. Looking southward, they saw the sea, and between it and them the dark green of the forest through which they had struggled for so many months. The gloom was broken at rare intervals by a streak of light, which was a river. Nearly five miles away stood Mount Godman, and beyond it, the huge southern face of the range, a gigantic black cliff, 80 miles from east to west, with a clear drop of nearly a mile and three quarters. By far the greatest precipice in the world. Behind this scarf rose the snow mountains, Mount Leonard Darwin to the northwest, 13,882 feet,

and to the northeast, Mount Indenburg, 15,379 feet, and the glittering top of Carstens, which is almost 16,000 feet. The Great Peak seemed below a mass of wild black precipices cleft with fissures, but above a long easy snowfield, curving gently to the summits. It was such a view as the old Portuguese adventurers might have had when, after struggling for months through the coastal jungles, they suddenly came in sight of Kenya or Kilimanjaro. But for Captain Rawling and his party, it would be no more than a pig-saw sight. Advance was impossible. The fatal choice of the Mamika route meant that they had taken the worst road conceivable to the great snows. The attainment of the peaks must be left to their successors.

He who would understand the full difficulties and miseries of that expedition must read Captain Rawling's own narrative. Rarely has a more thoroughly comfortless expedition been undertaken. To begin with, the food was bad and unsuitable, for they had the surplus stores from Shackleton's Antarctic expedition, and the joys of bully beef, pea soup, and pickles under an equatorial sky may be imagined. It was impossible to get good local assistance, for the natives were a preposterous race, treacherous and unreliable when they were not actively malevolent. They were subject to sudden panics when they fled into the jungle and to wild outbursts of sorrow when they would weep and sob for hours.

The imported Javanese were, if possible, more hopeless. Then there was every kind of noxious insect, Mosquitoes without end, gigantic leeches dangling from every leaf which made a specialty of attacking the eyeballs, ticks, stinking caterpillars, immense blue bottles which swarmed in clouds over any food left uncovered, crickets which ate up a man's clothes in a night, and a plague of minute bees which settled in myriads on the heated face of the traveler. Above all, there was the rain. The whole country was waterlogged by the flood, budding rivers and the incessant deluge. In the dry season, the average rainfall was about two and a half inches a day. Mr. Wallison took the trouble to keep a meteorological diary and found that during the first year, rain fell on 330 days and that on 295 days, it was accompanied

by thunder and lightning. Of the 400 men of all races employed during the first year, 12% died in the country from hardships, and 83% of the total force was invalited from New Guinea. Of the Europeans and natives who landed during that year, only 11 lasted out the whole 15 months of the expedition. Of these 11, four were Europeans, four Gurkhas, two Javanese soldiers, and one, a convict. When it is remembered that eight months is the maximum period allowed by the Dutch authorities for continued service in New Guinea, the marvel is that these eleven escaped with their lives. It was with no regret that Captain Rawling said farewell to what must be by far the most unpleasant land on earth. Quote, wild shrieks had greeted us on our first arrival in the country,

and while shrieks echoed down the still reach of the river as the boat crept toward the sea. Mount Carstons still awaits its conqueror. Since the Rawling expedition, much has been done in the exploration of the Central Mountains. In 1913, Mount Vilemina, 15,550 feet, of which Dr. Lawrence had drawn the lower snows, was finally ascended by Captain Herdenshee. In 1921, Captain Kremmer reached the same summit from the north and found the means of crossing the race. at a height of 13,480 feet. A German expedition under Dr. Moskowski, which was projected in 1913 to attempt Carstons from the north,

was stopped by the war. Meantime, in September 1912, Mr. Wallison, Captain Rawlings' companion, had returned to New Guinea and ascended the Utaqua River. Its headwaters led him direct to Carstons, and by establishing a series of depots for food in the foothills, he was able to reach the main massive of the mountain. Above 8,000 feet, he left the jungles behind. But the mountain proved very difficult, and the rain, as usual, fell without intermission.

At 14,200 feet, he reached the snow line, and on February 1st, 1913, from a camp above 12,000 feet, he climbed to 14,866 feet, a thousand feet or so below the summit. There he was stopped by an icefall, and lack of provisions and the weakness of his party prevented him from finding a way to turn it. The top of the mountain is an ice cap which breaks down very sheer on the south side, and Mr. Walliston is of the opinion that the easiest ascent would be from the north. This closes for the present, the history of the exploration of Carstens. For the second story, we move east into British territory. There, the general configuration is the same.

Swamps near the shore, then a tangled forest, then a range of inland mountains, though these are much less conspicuous than the ranges in Dutch territory, and scarcely rise above 6,000 feet. In 1911, the Honorable Miles Staniforth Smith, who had been mayor of Calgurli, and a senator representing West Australia in the Commonwealth Parliament, was at the time the administrator of Papua and sat out across the center of the unexplored part of his province to investigate the sources of the rivers emptying into the Papuan Gulf.

As the traveling was of the roughest and the aim was exploration rather than scientific research, the party was kept very small. Three white men, Mr. Stanforth's, Smith, Mr. Bell, the Chief Inspector of Native Affairs, and Mr. Pratt, a staff surveyor, together with 11 native police and 17 carriers. They started from the head of the navigable waters of the Kikor, or Erd River, meaning to push north to the top of Mount Murray, and then traversed to the west along the ridge. Mount Murray, which is some 6,000 feet high, was safely reached, and the explorers found themselves moving on a high limestone plateau, much fissured by streams and diversified by parallel ranges.

They hoped, ultimately, to reach the Strickland River, which is a tributary of the Great Fly River, and so complete the rest of their journey by rafts. Presently they found such a river running in a deep gorge, and from certain rapids which had been noted by earlier explorers, they assumed it to be the Strickland. Now began their adventures. The stream seemed to be a series of,

Wild Rapids, but as the Strickland had already been descended in rafts, the risks appeared to be justifiable and four rafts were built. Mr. Stanaforth Smith started out first with three police and two carriers, and Mr. Bell and Mr. Pratt arranged to follow in quick succession with the rest. In 200 yards, the first raft was upset, but its occupants managed to hang on. Instead of the rapids disappearing, they grew worse, and after four or five wild miles, the party dashed into a timber block. One of the natives was so seriously injured that he died the next morning. Mr. Stanaforth Smith then started to go back along the river in the hope of joining his companions, but found that he was on an island with swift streams on either side.

Next morning, the party tried to ford the river, and with some difficulty, succeeded. As they were cutting a track up a bank, they met two of the police who had lost their rifles and who informed them that Mr. Bell and Mr. Pratt were on the other bank of the river, and that several of the carriers had been drowned. The party had now been two days without food, so Mr. Staniforth Smith resolved to turn and travel down the stream in the hope of finding smoother water in a native village. They had no means of making a fire, and in any case there were no safe,

or breadfruit trees in the neighborhood. For five and a half days, the explorers hacked their way downstream. During all that time, they had no food of any kind and no shelter from torrential rains except a few palm leaves. On the sixth day, after traveling 20 miles, they saw natives on the opposite bank. They built a rough raft and managed to cross. It was just in time, for they were now utterly exhausted. But the food which the natives gave them revolved.

them. Curiously enough, as they were at their meal, the party of Mr. Bell and Mr. Pratt came out of the jungle. They had, if possible, suffered even worse disasters. Both the white men, though powerful swimmers, had been nearly drowned, and seven of the carriers had lost their lives. They would certainly have perished had they not had the luck the day before to shoot a wild pig. By this time, it was clear that whatever stream they were on, it was not the Strickland, for the Strickland flowed southwest, and this river ran nearly due east. The natives, who had never seen a white van before, took them to their village and treated them kindly. The good repute to the British official throughout the wilds now stood them in good stead.

They hoped that the river would soon be clear of rapids, but to their consternation there was nothing but gorges and whirlpools for another hundred miles. The stream was the Kikor and the Middle Reaches, the same stream, as they had ascended from the coast. It took them 29 days to pass the hundred miles of gorges, and during that time they rarely had a full meal. On one occasion, the whole party worked for seven days without getting anything to eat, except a few handfuls of soup powder and a few tins of cocoa, saved from the capsized rafts. They had no matches, so they had to keep a fire burning day and night. They slept in caves and under palm leaves, which made no way.

pretense of keeping out the rain. By the 29th day, the river seemed smooth enough for rafts, and the explorers again embarked and managed to cover 50 miles without any serious misadventure. But next day, the rapids began again, and their two canoes made of hollow logs were upset. They descended the rapids for ten miles, hanging on to the upturned logs before they could land. That night they spent in the rain without food. And, starting again at daybreak, they suddenly saw to their immense relief, European tents, and were welcomed by an officer of the constabulary who had been sent out to look for them. They had reached the exact spot from which they had struck north to Mount Murray at the beginning

of their journey. When, two days later, they arrived at the coast, they had traveled in 15 weeks, approximately 524 miles through utterly unknown country, 374 miles on foot and 150 by river. Mr. Staniforth Smith encountered every misfortune that can meet the traveler except one. He had no trouble with the natives. Indeed, by his tact and patience, he made friends everywhere with the Bushmen, and the survivors of the party owed to them their lives.

By some strange system of Bush telegraphy, the repute to the white men was spread from village to village. It was the one piece of good fortune that befell the explorers, and it was final in its effect, for it made the difference between life and death. I do not know any narrative exploration which contains adventures more desperate than those whirling voyages on upturned rafts through black ravines, or that month when starving men hacked their way through the jungle along the torrents bank and a perpetual tempest of rain. End of Chapter 8 Chapter 9 of The Last Secrets by John Buckin.

This Libravox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 9, Part 1, Mount Everest. The Himalaya not only contain the loftiest peaks on the globe, but can boast at least 80 summits loftier than those of any other range. The Andes come next, but their highest point, at Comcagua, is only 23,060 feet. In the huge mountain land which bounds India on the north and which stretches as great a distance as from the English Channel to the Caspian,

there are more than 80 peaks above 24,000 feet, some 20 above 26,000 and 6 above 27,000. Mount Everest, the highest, is, according to the latest measurements, 29,140 feet high. Its true character was not always recognized. At one time, Jimborazo and the Andes was thought to outsoor Himalay. In the middle of the last century, Kanchenjunga, which fills the eye of the traveler who looks north from Darjeeling, was believed to be the loftiest of the world's mountains. At that time, officers of the Indian government were conducting the great trigonometrical survey, during which they discovered a summit for which they could find

no native name, in which they labeled Peak 15. In 1852, when the observations had been worked out, an official rushed breathlessly into the room of the surveyor general in Calcutta, with the news that Peak 15 proved to be 29,000 two feet high, and was therefore the chief mountain in the world. As its native name was unknown, it was called after Sir George Everest, who had been in charge of the survey. The name is beautiful in itself and may well stand, though had the circumstances been otherwise, there would have been much said for the Tibetan name Jomo Lungmo, which means goddess mother of the mountains. The ascent of Everest was a project which only slowly entered into men's minds.

When the Great Peak was first discovered, mountaineering was still in its infancy, and for a generation afterwards, climbers were preoccupied with the Alps. Then mountaineers began to look farther afield, and first the Caucasus and then the Andes were conquered, till some 30 years ago the ambitious began to turn their eyes to the Himalaya. Gradually, the limit of achievement on high snows was extended.

On Tricul, Dr. Longstaff, in ten and a half hours, ascended from 17,450 feet to the summit of 23,360 feet. On Camet, Mr. Charles Meade took Cooley's up to a camp of 23,600 feet. The Duke of the Abruzi, after his ascent of Ruinzori, attacked with a splendidly equipped party, K2, that icy lump in the Karakorum, the second highest, of the world's mountains, and reached the height of 24,600 feet, which till the year 1921 remained the world's record. In 1920, Dr. Kellis found that on reasonable snow, he could ascend at a rate of 600 feet an hour above 21,000 feet. It was inevitable that, when the Great War was over, lovers of high places should fix their thoughts on Everest. It had long been a dream of mountaineers.

Lord Curzon, when Viceroy of India, had suggested the exploration of Everest to the Royal Geographical Society and the Alpine Club. But there were political difficulties connected with the journey through Tibet or Nepal, and even a reconnaissance of the mountain proved impossible. Cecil Rowling, who fell at the Third Battle of Iper as a Brigadier General with the 21st Division, during his journey in 1904 to the headwaters of the Brahmaputra, saw for the first time from a distance of 60 miles the north side of Everest and believed that it might be climbed. I well remember how, in the year before the war, he and I planned an expedition, which was to cover two seasons and explore that northern side.

In March, 1919, Captain Noel urged the Royal Geographical Society to undertake the work, and Sir Francis Younghusband, the president of the society in the following year, in conjunction with the Alpine Club entered into negotiations with the government of India. Permission was obtained from the Tibetan authorities and in January 1921, a joint committee of the Royal Geographical Society in the Alpine Club proceeded to organize an expedition.

There were many to ask, what was the use of such an enterprise, which would be costly, difficult, and certainly dangerous? The answer is that it was of no earthly use, and that in that lay its supreme merit. The war had called forth the finest qualities of human nature, and with the advent of peace, there seemed a risk of the world slipping back into dull materialism. Men had begun to ask of everything its cash value, and to cherish, as if it were of virtue, a narrow utilitarian common sense.

To embark upon something which had no material, value was a vindication of the essential idealism of the human spirit. In Sir Francis Younghusband's words, quote, The sight of climbers struggling upwards to the supreme pinnacle would have taught men to lift their eyes to the hills, to raise them off the ground, and divert them, if only for a moment,

to something pure and lofty and satisfying to that inner craving for the worthiest which all men have hidden in their souls. And when they see men thrown back at first, but returning again and again to the assault, till, with faltering footsteps and gasping breaths, they at last reach the summit, they will thrill with pride. They will no longer be obsessed with the thought

of what mites they are in comparison with the mountain, how insignificant they are beside their material surroundings. They will have a proper pride in themselves and a well-grounded faith in the capacity of spirit to dominate material, end quote. these are almost the words of a theophile gautier's defense of mountaineers quote il solvalante protestant contra l'aboublah and plent on the incessible the draple of intelligence humane if the climber wants a further statement of his creed let it be that of mr belloc when he first saw the alps from the ridge of the juror Quote, up there the sky above and below them the great peaks made communion between that homing,

creeping part of me which loves vineyards and dances and a slow movement among pastures, and that other part which is only properly at home in heaven. These, the Great Alps, seen thus, link one in some way to one's immortality. Nor is it possible to convey or even to suggest these few 50 miles and these few thousand feet there is something more. Let me put it thus, that from the height of the Weisenstein I saw, as it were, my religion. I mean humility, the fear of death, the terror of height or distance, the glory of God, the infinite potentiality of reception, whence springs that divine thirst of the soul. My aspiration also toward completion and my confidence in the dual destiny.

for I know that we laughers have a gross cousinship with the most high, and it is this constant and perpetual quarrel which feeds the spring of merriment and the soul of a sane man. Since I could now see such a wonder, and it could work such things in my mind, therefore someday I should be part of it. That is what I feel. That is also which leads some men to climb mountain tops, but not me, for I am afraid of a slipping down, end quote. And now for the great mountain itself. First of all, it is a rock peak.

All the upper part is a great pyramid of stone with three main or reeds, the west, the southwest, and the northeast. It lies exactly on the frontier between Tibet and Nepal, and from the Nepal-Eas side and the plains of India, it is hard to get a good view of it, for only a wedge of it. for only a wedge of white has seen peeping between and over other peaks. On the Tibetan side, however, it stands clear, and its preeminence over its neighbors is patent.

Now, in all attacks upon a great peak, the first question is how to get to it, a problem most difficult in the case of other Himalayan summits like K2 and of peaks like Mount McKinley in Alaska and Mount Robson in Canada. It is not only the question of the climbers, getting there, but of transporting the food and tents and accessories required by a well-equipped expedition. Had the only route to Everest laying through the deep-cut gorges of Nepal, the transport problem might have been insuperable. But here came in the value of Tibet, which is a high plateau,

averaging 12, or 13,000 feet. It was possible to take a large party with baggage animals up through the passes of Sikkim to the Camp of Zong, and then westward along the north side of the range to a base camp at Tingred Zong, due north of the mountain. Everest itself would be 40 or 50 miles from such a base camp, but there was a clear road to it by the upper glens and glaciers of the Arun, which flows north and east before it turns south and cuts its way through the Himalayan Wall. The problem of access to the base was, therefore, not a hard one. The problem of the ascent was twofold.

Part physiological, part physical. Could human beings survive at an altitude of 29,000 feet? Human beings who were forced to carry loads and to move their limbs? Aviators, of course, had risen to greater heights, but they had not been compelled to exert themselves. Could a man in action support life in that rarefied air? Above 20,000 feet, a cubic foot of air contains less than half the oxygen which it holds at sea level. As the working of the body depends upon the oxygen supplied through the lungs,

this fact was bound to lessen enormously man's physical energy. On the other hand, it had been found that the human frame could adapt itself to great altitudes by increasing the number of red blood corpuscles. Dr. Kellis had been able to climb 600 feet an hour above 21,000 feet, and Mr. Mead had camped in comparative comfort at 23,600 feet. Still, the highest altitude yet reached had been only 24,600 feet, and no one could say what difference the extra 4,500 feet might make. clearly before final climbing began it would be necessary to acclimatize the party in the last resort oxygen might be artificially supplied to the climbers the physiological problem was of the kind which could only be solved in practice the second was the physical a man might live and even move slowly above say 26,000 feet but it was quite certain that no human being would be capable of the

severe exertions required by difficult climbing. If the last stage of Everest proved to be like the last stages of many Himalayan mountains, then the thing was strictly impossible. The hope was that on the Tibetan side the Areats might be easy going. It all depended upon finding an easy route and being able to make an ultimate camp at some point like 26,000 feet. There was good hope that the first might be possible, judging from Rawlinson's survey at a distance of 60 miles and the known geographical features of the Tibetan side of the range. The other physical difficulties would be the gigantic scale of Himalayan obstacles, the hugeness of the ice fields and glaciers, the immensity of the rockfalls and avalanches. Also, at a great height, there would be the bitter cold to lower vitality and the likelihood of

violent winds. Much would depend on the weather, which was still. an unknown quantity. Indeed, all the physical factors were in the region of speculation. Only a reconnaissance could determine them. It might be that the expedition would have to turn back at once, confessing its task impossible. General Bruce, who was the chief living authority on Himalayan traveling, was unable to accompany the party, so Colonel Howard Bury was selected as leader. An elaborate scientific equipment was prepared and steps were taken to get the full scientific value out of the journey. But the primary object was mountaineering. First, the reconnaissance, and then, if fortune favored, an effort to reach the summit. The four climbers chosen were

Mr. Harold Rayburn, who in 1920 had done good work on the spurs of Kensingunga, Dr. Kellis, who had reached 23,400 feet on Kemet, and two younger men, Mr. George Lee Mallory and Mr. Bullock, distinguished members of the Alpine Club, who had been together at Winchester. In India, they were to be joined by Major Morsehead and Major Wheeler of the Indian Survey. Early in May, 1921, the party assembled at Darjeeling. The start from Darjeeling was on 18th of May.

The first stage through Sycambe and by way of Chumli Valley to the Tibetan Plateau was over-familiar ground, which need not be described. There was a good deal of trouble with the mules which had been badly chosen, but no incident of importance happened till Dochen was reached, the point where their road left the main road to Lhasa. At Campozong, Dr. Kellis died suddenly from heart failure, an irreparable loss to the expedition, for he had been one of the mountaineers from whom most was looked for,

and he was the only member of the party qualified by his medical knowledge to carry out experiments in oxygen and blood pressure. Then, too, Mr. Rayburn fell sick and had to return to sickom. The expedition made its way almost due west behind the main chain of the Himalaya, until one evening its members saw, almost due south of them, a beautiful peak, which was apparently very high, The natives called it Jomo Uri, which means the goddess of the turquoise peak,

and from observations next morning, it was clear that it was Everest. They passed some wonderful monasteries perching on the face of the perpendicular crags, and eventually on the 19th of June they reached Tingrid Zong after a month's traveling from Darjeeling. This was the spot they had decided upon for their base camp. The obvious route to Everest seemed to be by way of the Rongbuck Valley where the great Rungbuck Glacier flowed from its northern face. There, accordingly, the two climbers, Mr. Mallory and Mr. Bullock, established themselves. The preliminary reconnaissance, however, proved to be a somewhat intricate matter. It was soon plain that there were no easy approaches from the west. So, Colonel Howard

Bury moved his headquarters to Karta on the east side close to the Aran. That river, which there is about 100 yards wide, a little further down enters great gorges in which, within a course of 20 miles, it drops from 12,000 feet to 7,500 feet, or over 200 feet in a mile, a far more wonderful spectacle than anything on the Brahmaputra. On the 2nd of August, Mr. Mallory and Mr. Bullock started their exploration of the eastern approaches to the mountain. This was no easy business, for the valleys were separated by ridges, the lowest point of which was higher than any mountain in Europe, and every route had to be explored personally, for no information could be had from the natives. The two main valleys running down on the east side of Everest are the Karta and further south the Kama.

The latter valley was first explored, and it was found that it ended under the precipitous eastern face of the mountain, and that there was no way from it of reaching the northeast ridge. It was a marvelous valley for scenery, but for mountaineering impracticable. A move was accordingly made to the Carta Valley to the north. Mr. Mallory and Mr. Bullock proceeded up this till they reached the glacier of the Carta River, and at last found a valley which seemed to lead them, straight to the northeast ridge. It was now, however, early August, the monsoon was blowing, and everywhere there was deep, soft, fresh snow. They returned accordingly to the camp at Carter

to wait till weather conditions became better. What was called the Advanced Base Camp was established in the Carter Valley at a height of 17,350 feet, in a grassy hollow well sheltered from the wind and amid a glory of alpine flowers. meantime Mr. Mallory and Mr. Bullock spent their time in carrying wood and stores to a camp higher up the valley. This was finally established at a height of some 20,000 feet well up the Carta Glacier. At the glacier head was a pass called the Lachpala or Windy Gap, and the next step was to form a camp there at a height of 22,350 feet. It was in this neighborhood that the tracks, probably of a wolf were found, which the coolies attributed to the wild men of the snows.

From the Lakpala, the mountaineers were now looking straight at Everest, and at last were able to unriddle its tangled topography. The attention of the readers is called to the map. It will be seen that the great Rongbuck Glacier, which descends from the western side of the northern face, receives, as a feeder, the East Rongbuck Glacier. The entrance to the the latter is so small that Mr. Mallory and Mr. Bullock had failed to notice it in their exploration of the main glacier. This lesser Rangbuk glacier ends on the eastern part of the northern face of the mountains, and between its head and that of the main glacier is the pass called the Changla, or North Goal. From the Lakpala, one looks into the east Rangbuk Glacier with a north

coal straight in front. If the north goal could be attained, it seemed to the mountaineers to be be possible by working up the easy northern face to attain the northeast ridge at a point above the main difficulties. The camp on the Lac Fablo was not a comfortable place with a howling wind, 34 degrees of frost, and little stuffy tents which gave dubious protection and inevitable headaches. It was decided that the two expert alpine climbers with a few pick coolies should alone attempt the North Cole, and if fortune favored, prospect the farther route, while the others returned to the 20,000 feet camp. We are now concerned with the doings only of Mr. Mallory and Mr. Bullock, who were to attempt the North Cole. In the week since their arrival in the neighborhood of

Everest, they had been studying its contours with the eyes of trained mountaineers. They saw that it was a great rock mass, quote, coated often with a thin layer of white powder, which is blown about its sides and bearing perennial snow only on the gentler ledges and on several wide faces less steep than the rest." They saw that from the point to the northeast shoulder, a more or less broad a reet fell northward to the snow-call called the Changla. If they could reach that snow-call, the road to the northeast ridge looked reasonably simple. They had seen that the Chang-law would be very difficult of attainment from the Rongbuk Glacier, and that was why they had turned their minds to an eastern approach.

Here is their conclusion, in Mr. Mallory's words, reached about the third week in July. Quote, If ever the mountain were to be climbed, the way would not lie along the whole length of any one of its colossal ridges. Progress could only be made along comparatively easy ground, and anything like a prolonged sharp crest or a series of towers would inevitably bar the way simply by the time it would require to overcome such obstacles.

But the north are coming down to a gap between Everest and the North Peak, Changstee, is not of this character. From the horizontal structure of the mountain, there is no excrescence of rock pinnacles in this part, and the steep walls of rock which run across the north face or merged with it before they reach this part, which is comparatively smooth and continuous, a bluntly rounded edge. The great question before us now was to be one of access. Could the North Coal be reached from the east, and how could we attain this point? We have seen the two climbers as far on their journey as the Lakhpala, looking over the East Rongbuk Glacier to the North Coal. The chief difficulty, it was soon evident, would be the wall under

the coal, which must be over 500 feet high, and appeared to be very steep. On the morning of the 23rd of September, Mr. Mallory, Mr. Bullock, and Mr. Wheeler started from the camp on the Loch Pabla with ten coolies, some of whom were mountain sick, and all of whom were affected by the height. They started late and resolved to make an easy day, pitching their tents that night in the open snow under the north coal. They had looked for a show, and they had looked for a sheltered camp, but the place proved to be a temple of the winds, and no one that night had much sleep. Next morning, the 24th, a few hours after sunrise, they began to climb the slopes under the wall and found them easier than they had feared. By 1130, the party was on the call. Only three coolies

had accompanied them, two of whom were already very tired. Of the three sahibs, only Mr. Mallory was in anything like good condition. The place was scourged by icy blasts and frequently in a whirl of powdery snow, but there could be no doubt that the Ereak in front of them was accessible. In that gale, however, they dare not attempt it, so they struggled back to their camp below the wall. Next morning, the 25th, a council of war was held. It was clear that they must either go on or go back. In their plan, they had dreamed of making a camp at 26,000 feet,

but that was now out of the question. It was too late in the season, the weather was too bad, and the party was too weak. There was nothing for it but to return, and accordingly they struggled over the Lakhpala back to the Carter Valley and the road to England. The reconnaissance of 1921 had established certain facts of the first importance. The first was as to the proper season for the attempt. The rainfall in the Himalaya that year was abnormal, and the monsoon began and finished later than usual. But it was clear that between its end and the coming of winter, there was not sufficient time to give climbers a chance of good weather. The next attempt must obviously be made before the coming of the monsoon, that is, in May or June. The second fact established was the best way

of attempting the summit. The only feasible route lay from the Changla up the subsidiary ridge to the shoulder of the northeast or eight. The distance from the Changla to the top was not more than two miles and the rise not more than 6,000 feet. So far as the climbers on the pass could judge, and their conclusion was supported by numerous photographs from other points, there seemed to be no very great difficulties on this route in the shape of steep rocks. It looked as if it might be practicable to find a site for a camp at about 26,000 feet. By this route, the northeast would be reached at about 28,000 feet. The thousand feet from that point to the summit looks slightly more difficult and appeared to possess certain rock towers which, however, might be circumvented.

The actual top seemed to be a cap of snow with a steep, blunt edge on the side of the ridge. The transport question must always be difficult. The thousand feet from the East Rongbuk glacier to the Changla, half of which was very steep, might give trouble to laden coolies, especially earlier in the season when the ice was uncovered by snow. An advanced base camp on the Changla would, of course, be essential if a high camp were to be made at 26,000 feet.

But the physical problem might be regarded as solve, at any rate, as far as the shoulder of the northeast are eaten. On the physiological question, little light had been thrown. The climbers in September 1921 were all more or less tired from spending long periods and high camps and could not be regarded as at the top of their form. Yet in the cases of most members of the party, the process of acclimatization had been rapid and Mr. Mallory on the Changla was remarkably fit. what would happen however at the higher altitudes the effect of these upon the human body had not been decided the conclusion from the year's work was that while no insuperable difficulty had been proved in the problem

yet for success there must be a combination of happy chances in the shape of weather the condition of the snow the endurance of the transport coolies and the bodily fitness of the climbers a second attempt would be a second attempt would be be justified, but it could not be regarded with anything like confidence. The enterprise was seriously and responsibly envisioned, and no better expression of the spirit of those who undertook it can be found than in Mr. Mallory's own words. It might be possible for two men to struggle somehow to the summit, disregarding every other consideration. It is a different matter to climb the mountain as mountaineers would have climbed it. Principles, time-honored in the Alpine Club, must, of course, be respected in the ascent of Mount Everest. The party must keep a margin of safety. It is not to be a mad enterprise rashly pushed on regardless of danger. The ill-considered

acceptance of any and every risk has no part in the essence of persevering courage. A mountaineering enterprise may keep sanity and sound judgment and remain an adventure. And of all the principles to which we hold, the first is that of mutual help. What is to be done for a man who is sick or abnormally exhausted at these high altitudes? His companions must see to it that he has taken down at the first opportunity and with an adequate escort. And the obligation is the same whether he be sahib or Kuli. If we ask a man to carry our loads up the mountain, we must care for his welfare at need. End of Chapter 9, Part 1. Chapter 9 of the Last Secrets by John Buckin. This Librovox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 9, Part 2, Mount Everest. The 1922 party had, as its leader, Brigadier General

the Honorable C.G. Bruce, the supreme authority upon the Himalaya, to the exploration of which he had devoted much of his life. He knew the hill people, too, as no other man knew them, and his advice was invaluable in the selection of porters. The climbers were Mr. Mallory, Mr. Finch, who had been selected for the expedition of the year before, but had been unable to accompany it. Mr. Norton and Mr. Somerville. all of whom were trained mountaineers, and Captain Jeffrey Bruce, who had never done any serious climbing before. Major Morse head was also of the party. The 1921 expedition had discovered what seemed a possible route to the summit by the North Pole, and the new expedition proposed to follow its tracks. It was

stronger in personnel than its predecessor, and much stronger in equipment, for it had learned many lessons from the experiences of the year before. Among other things, it carried a supply of oxygen and bottles and the necessary apparatus to use it. The party, being resolved to make the attempt before the monsoon broke, made straight for the old advanced base camp in the Carter Valley. Thanks to General Bruce's consummate skilled in the organization of mountain travel, it reached that point on the date fixed and with everybody in good health. The next duty was to establish an advanced camp one stage before the North Coal, up to which the porters could be brought without undue fatigue. The summit of the Lakhpala was abandoned and an advanced base, known as Camp No. 3, was established under the west side of the pass, close to the East Rongbuck Glacier.

The next step was to ascertain whether the road to the North Coal was practicable, for when Mr. Mallory's part, had traveled at the year before, there had been fresh snow, and at this early season, there was a danger of bare ice. Mr. Somerville and Mr. Mallory on the 13th May, with one Cooley, set forth from Camp No. 3 on a reconnaissance, and found that the route they had followed the year before was one sheet of glittering ice. They saw, however, that they could cut their way into a corridor filled with good snow, which would lead them up to the foot of the final slope. and that final slope proved also to be snow and not ice. On the North Coal, they found a difficulty they had not looked for.

Between the point at which they reached it and Everest itself was an ice cliff, which the year before they had circumvented. Now they found their way barred by a hopeless crevasse. Ultimately, they discovered a route at the far end of the ice cliff and reached the level snow from which the north ridge of Everest, springs. The next few days were occupied in bringing up supplies to camp four on the North Coal. They had only nine porters available, and this decided them that it would not be feasible to make two camps on the face of the mountain. They resolved to attempt to make one camp at about

26,000 feet, and from that, to make their final effort. On the 19th, the four climbers, Mr. Mallory, Mr. Norton, Major Mooreshead, and Mr. Somerville, left Camp 3 at a quarter to 9 in the morning, and an hour after midday were busy putting up tents and arranging stores at Camp 4 on the North Gull. The sunset at 4.30, and they turned in for the night in the best of spirits. On the morrow, they proposed to carry up two of the small tents, two double sleeping sacks, food for a day and a half, cooking pots, and two thermos flasks. They would make four loads of the stuff, which would give two porters to each load with a man to spare. On the 20th of May, Mr. Mallory got up at 5 a.m. and found that there was no sign of life in the tents in which the nine porters were quartered.

The coolies had shut themselves in so hermetically that they were all unwell, and four of them were suffering badly from mountain sickness. Only five were able to embark on the day's work. Breakfast was a slow business because everything was frozen hard, and the dish of spaghetti which they had promised themselves could only be prepared after an elaborate process of thawing. A start was made at 7 a.m., and everything went smoothly at first, for ropes had been fixed between their camp and the call itself so as to help them on their return. From the call, a broad snow ridge went up at an easy angle, and all the climbers felt that bodily fitness, which is the assurance of success.

Then their troubles began. The first was the cold. The sun had no more warmth in it than a candle, and a bitter wind began to blow from the west. They came to an end of the ridge of stones on which they had been progressing easily, and realized that they must get some shelter from the wind by moving to the east side of the shoulder. Step cutting was now necessary, and at that height, the exertion required was extraordinarily severe. Moreover, the cold was telling upon them, and the porters especially suffered badly. After some 300 feet of steps, they rested about noon under the shelter of some rocks at 25,000 feet. It seemed to them that they could not get their loads much higher, and that they had better look out for a camp, for the porter's

had to return to the North Coal. But a camping ground was not easy to find. At last, on the east side of the ridge, they discovered a steep slab up to which they could level the ground. It was a poor place, for the incline was sharp, most of the floor was composed of broken rocks, and men lying down would inevitably slip on top of each other. There, however, they placed the little tents,

each with its double sleeping bag, and melted snow for their makeshift supper. The porter started back for the North Cole, and the climbers, two in each bed, did their best to keep warm. All four had suffered a good deal from the cold. Mr. Norton's ear was badly swollen. Three of Mr. Mallory's fingers were touched with the frost,

and Major Morsehead was chilled to the bone and clearly unwell. The wind dropped in the evening, and during the night fresh snow fell. At 6.50 on the morning of the 21st of May, they crawled from their sleeping bags and made a laborious and exiguous breakfast for only one thermos flask had turned up. At eight o'clock they started, none of them feeling their best after the stuffy, headachey night. Major Moorshead was unable to go with him, for his illness had increased, and most regretfully the other three went on without him. A good deal of fresh snow had fallen, but the first hours of climbing were not very difficult. The worst trouble was the perverse stratification of the mountain, for all the ledges tilted the wrong way. Slowly they crawled up, first regaining the ridge by turning west, and then following the ridge itself in the direction of the point of the northeast are.

They decided that they must turn back at about two o'clock if they were to make the descent and reason. safety. Besides, they had to consider Major Moorshead left alone in Camp 5. At 2.15, they reached the head of the rocks, about 500 feet below the point where the north shoulder joined the northeast area. Here they had a clear view of the summit. The aneroid gave the elevation as 26,800 feet, but it is possible that it may have been nearly 200 feet more. Their advance had for some time been reduced to a very slow crawl, but none of the party were really exhausted. It was wise, however, to turn while they had sufficient strength to get back to Camp 4. They tried moving westward where there seemed to be more snow, but they found that the snow slopes were a series of slabs with an ugly tilt

under a thin covering of new snow. So they went back to the ridge and followed their old tracks. At four o'clock they reached Camp 5 and picked up Major Moorshead in their tents and sleeping bags. After that, the going became more difficult as the fresh fallen snow had made even easy ground treacherous. One slip did occur, and the three men were held only by the rope secured around Mr. Mallory's ice axe. The descent now became a race with a fast-gathering darkness. When they got to the snow ridge, they could find no trace of the steps they had to made the day before, and had to cut them all over again. At this point, they were incited the watchers far below at Camp 3 on the glacier. Major Mooreshead was suffering severely and could only move

a few steps at a time. As the night drew in, lightning began to flicker from the clouds in the west, but happily the wind did not rise. They were soon at the crevasses and the ice cliff, and as their air was calm it was possible to light a lantern to guide them. They hunted desperately to find the fixed rope, which would take them down to the terrace where they could see their five tents awaiting them, but the rope was covered with snow, and at that moment the lantern gave out. Happily, somebody hooked up the buried rope, and after that it was plain going to the tents.

They reached them at 11.30 and could find no fuel or cooking pots. Their mouths were parched with thirst, and the best beverage they could concoct was a mixture of jam and snow with frozen condensed milk. Mr. Mallory ascribes to the influence of this stuff, quote, the uncontrollable shudderings, spasms of muscular contraction in belly and back, which I suffered in my sleeping bag, and which caused me to sit up and a hail again great whiffs from the night air, as though the habit of deep breathing had settled upon me indispensably, end quote. The four men did not waste time next morning on the North Coal,

for they were tormented by thirst and hunger. It took them six hours to reach Camp Three, for they had to make a staircase beneath the new snow which the porters could use in order to fetch down their baggage, since they did not intend to spend the night at Camp Three without their sleeping bags. At midday they were back in comparative comfort,

with certain solid conclusions as a result of the venture. One was as to the difficulties of the new snow and the precariousness of the weather. Another was as to the unexpected capacity of the porters. But the most important was as to the need of oxygen. They had reached a point very little below 27,000 feet, and that left 2,000 feet to be surmounted before the summit was reached. For success, a higher camp was needed, in Camp 5, and the men who started from it must, if possible, have an extra stimulus to counteract

the malign effects of altitude. If Everest chose to clothe itself with air containing less oxygen than a man needed, the defect must be supplied. If a climber used extra clothes to counteract the cold, he must use some extra device to supplement the atmosphere. We come now to the second attempt of 1922 in which oxygen was used. Certain eminent scientists at home had held that Everest could never be conquered without its aid, and the expedition had brought a very full equipment. Oxygen stored in light steel cylinders and a somewhat complex apparatus for its use. There had been oxygen drill parades among the party, and perhaps it might have been well had they used it straight away for one main attempt, instead of making the first effort without it.

Unfortunately, the apparatus needed overhauling, and it was not till the 22nd of May when Mr. Mallory and his party were coming down from the mountain that four sets were ready for use. As to the legitimacy of such a device in mountaineering, Mr. Finch's arguments are final. Quote, few of us, I think, who stopped to ponder for a brief second,

will deny that our very existence in this enlightened 20th century with all its amenities of modern civilization is artificial. Most of us have learned to respect progress and to appreciate the meaning and advantages of adaptability. For instance, it is a fairly firmly established fact that warmth is necessary to life. The mountaineer, acting on this knowledge, conserves as far as possible his animal heat by wearing especially warm clothing. No one demers. It is the common-sense thing to do. He pours hot tea from a thermos bottle and never blushes.

Nonchalantly, without fear of adverse criticism, he doctors up his insides with special heat and energy-giving foods and stimulants. From the sun's ultraviolet rays and the winds bitter cold, he boldly dares to protect his eyes with Crook's anti-glare glasses. Further, he wears boots that to the average layman look ridiculous. The use of caffeine to supply just a little more buck to an almost worn-out frame is not cavilat, despite its being a synthetic drug, the manufacture of which involves the employment of complicated plant and methods. If science could prepare oxygen in tabloid form or supply it to us in thermos flasks that we might imbibe it like our hot tea,

the stigma of artificiality would perhaps be effectually removed. but when it has to be carried in special containers, its whole essence is held to be altered, and by using it, the mountaineer is taking a sneaking, unfair advantage of the mountain. In answer to this grave charge, I would remind the accuser that, by the inhalation of a little life-giving gas, the climber does not smooth away the rough rocks of the mountain or still a storm, nor is he in the Lattin, who, by a rub on a magic ring,

wafted by invisible agents to his goal. Oxygen renders available more of his store of energy, and so hastens his step, but it does not, alas, fit the wings of mercury to his feet. The logic of the anti-oxygenist is surely faulty, end quote. On the 20th of May, Mr. Finch and Captain Jeffrey Bruce arrived at Camp 3, accompanied by Tejbier,

one of the four Gurkha non-commissioned officers lent to the expedition. There they found the oxygen apparatus in bad condition and had to tinker at it for four days. During this period, they made a trial trip to camp four on the North Coal using oxygen. A good deal of new step-cutting had to be done, for fresh snow had fallen, but in spite of that, the oxygen enabled them to get to the call in three hours and return in 50 minutes, with halts to take three dozen photographs. On the 24th of May, Mr. Finch, Captain Bruce, Captain Noel, the official photographer, and Tedgemere, with 12 porters, went up the north call and camp for the night.

The next morning, the 25th brought a clear, windy sky, and at 8 o'clock the 12 porters with the camp outfit, provisions for one day, and the oxygen cylinders started up the North Ridge, followed an hour and a half later by Mr. Finch, Captain Bruce, and Ted's Beir, each carrying a load of over 30 pounds. All 15 used oxygen. It was their intention to make a camp above 26,000 feet. But after one o'clock, the wind freshened and snow began, so it was deemed advisable in order to ensure the safe return of the porters to the North Coal to camp at 25,500 feet. The camping place was no better than that which Mr. Mallory had found. The place was on the actual crest of the ridge, for the west side was scourged by wind,

and there was no good position on the east side. The tent was pitched on a little platform on the edge of precipices falling to the east Rongbook glacier 4,000 feet below. The tent was secured as well as possible by guy ropes. But when the climbers got into their sleeping bags, it was both blowing and snowing hard and minute flakes filled a tin. Snow was melted and a tepid meal was cooked. A really warm meal was out of the question for at that altitude, water boils at so low a temperature that man can hold his hand in it without discomfort. As the night closed in, the two climbers

comforted themselves with the assurance that next day they would get to the top. But after sunset, the wind increased to a gale so furious that even the ground sheet with three men lying on it was lifted completely off the earth. They blocked up the small openings as well as they could, but before midnight everything inside was covered with spin drift. It was impossible to sleep. They had to be constantly on the watch to prevent the flaps being torn open and to hold the tent down. For they realized that if once the gale got a hold of their shelter, the whole out of their shelter, the whole out of that would be blown on to the glacier below. Few adventurers have ever spent a more awful night.

Tedgebeer had all the placidity of his race, and Captain Bruce, who was making his first serious mountaineering expedition on the highest of the world's mountains, was as cheerful as if he had been sleeping in an ordinary alpine cabane. Here is Mr. Finch's own description. Quote, By one o'clock on the morning of the 26th, the gale reached its maximum. The wild flapping of the canvas made a noise like that of machine-gun

fire. So deafening was it that we could scarcely hear each other speak. Later there came interludes of comparative lull, succeeded by bursts of storm more furious than ever. During such lulls, we took it in turn to go outside to tighten up slacken guy ropes and also succeeded in tying down the tent more firmly with our alpine rope. It was impossible to work in the open for more than three or four minutes at a stretch, so profound was the exhaustion induced by this brief exposure to the fierce cold wind." Morning broke with no lull in the violence of the elements. They prepared a makeshift meal and spent the four noon hours in desperate anxiety. At midday the storm seemed to reach the summit of its fury, and matters were made more awkward by a stoke.

cutting a great hole in the tent. Mercifully, an hour later, the wind suddenly dropped, and the anxious occupants of the tent could prospect the weather. The sensible thing would have been to make a retreat to the North Coal, but there was no thought of giving up. The party were unanimous and resolving to hang on and make the attempt the following day. With the last of their fuel they cooked supper, a frugal meal, for since they had only carried provisions for one day, they were now on very short rations.

As they settled down for the night, voices were heard outside, and the porters from the North Coal appeared, bringing thermos flasks of hot beef tea and tea sent by Captain Noel. In a little more comfort, they tried to sleep. All three, however, were strained and weak from their labors at the past 24 hours, and they felt a numbing cold critical. up their limbs. Mr. Finch had the happy inspiration to use oxygen, and so arranged the apparatus that each could breathe a small quantity throughout the night. Quote, the result was marvelous. We slept well and warmly. Whenever the tube delivering the gas fell out of Bruce's mouth as he slept, I could see him stir uneasily in the eerie, greenish light of the moon as it filtered through the canvas. Then half-unconsciously

replacing a tube, he would fall once more into a peaceful slumber, end quote. Next morning, the 27th, they woke well and hungry, and after a struggle with their boots, which were frozen stiff, started off at 6.30, Captain Bruce and Mr. Finch carrying each over 40 pounds and Tedgebier some 50 pounds. Their plan was to take Tidgebyr as far as the northeast shoulder, and there to relieve him of his load and send him back. It was cold, clear weather, and the wind was not too strong. Presently, however, it began to freshen, and after they had gained a few hundred feet, it was Tejbibir who showed the first signs of weakness. He collapsed entirely, and had to be relieved of the cylinders and sent back.

The height was about 26,000 feet, the highest point which any native had yet reached. In order to move more quickly, Mr. Finch and Captain Bruce, dispensed with a rope. The rocks were quite easy, and at 26,500 feet, they had passed two admirable sights for a camp. But the wind was steadily increasing in force, and they were compelled to leave the ridge and traverse out across the Great North Face. This was bad luck, for the ridge was easy climbing, and the face was not. The stratification of the rocks was most awkward, and it was hard to find any good footholds. The climbers were unroped, and it was a severe test of Captain Bruce, who had had no mountaineering experience to give him confidence. Sometimes they were on treacherous slopes,

sometimes on more treacherous snow, and they often had to cross heaps of scree that moved with every step. They stopped occasionally to replace an empty cylinder of oxygen with a new one, each of which meant five pounds off their load. Presently, the aneroid gave their height as 27,000 feet. They now ceased traversing and began to climb straight upward to a point on the northeast ridge halfway between the shoulder and the summit. Soon they were at 27,300 feet, and the top of Everest was the only mountain they could see without looking down. The peaks, which it seemed so formidable from the glacier, had now sunk into insignificant humps. They were 1,700 feet below the summit, well within half a mile of it, and they could distinguish stones

in a patch of scree, just under its highest point. But it was very clear that they could go no farther. Weak with hunger and the anxiety and labors of the past 48 hours, it was plain to Mr. Finch that if they went on even for another 500 feet, they would not both get back alive. Like wise and brave men, they decided to retreat. It was now about midday, and for greater safety, they roped together. At first, they followed their old tracks, and then moved towards the north ridge at a point higher than where they had left it. They reached the ridge at two o'clock, and there reduced their burden by dumping four oxygen cylinders at a place to which future climbers could be directed. The weather was getting worse. A violent wind from the west was bringing up mist, but happily,

there was no snow. Half an hour later they reached their camp at the night before where they found Tejbjbier sound asleep wrapped up in all three sleeping bags. The porters from the North Cole were a mile below, and Tejbjbier was instructed to go down with them. The rest of the descent was a nightmare. The knees of the climbers knocked together, and their limbs did not seem to respond to the direction of the brain. Often they staggered and slipped, and often they were forced to sit down. But at four o'clock in the afternoon, they reached the North Cole. Happily, they still felt famished. They had not yet reached the limit of a man's strength when hunger vanishes.

At the North Cole, they had hot tea and spaghetti, and three quarters of an hour later they started off for Camp 3 in the company of Captain Noel. The journey was made in record time, 40 minutes, and at 5.30 they had reached Camp 3, having descended since midday. 6,000 feet. That evening made amends for the long hours of famine. Quote, four whole coils, truffled in paté de foie gras, followed by nine sausages, left me asking for more.

The last I remember of that long day was going to sleep, warm in the depths of our wonderful sleeping bag, with the remains of a tin of toffee tucked away in the crook of my elbow. end quote. Captain Bruce's feet were badly frostbitten, but Mr. Finch had come off Scott Free, which was neither more nor less than a physical miracle. As Captain Bruce, on the way down to the base camp, turned to take his last close view of Everest, his farewell was, quote, just you wait, old thing, you will be for it soon, end quote. It was the logical conclusion. He and Mr. Finch had got the 27,300 feet after exertions and deprivations which might well have unfitted a man for the ascent to the Rigi. These misfortunes were accidental and not inevitable. The value, the superlative value

of oxygen, had been abundantly proved. It may be fairly said that the 1922 expedition, though it had not set foot on the summit, had solved the secret of Everest. The mountain could almost certainly be climbed, provided a little luck attended the climbers. Now that the quality of the native porters had been proved, there seems no reason why, with the help of oxygen, a sixth camp could not be arranged on one of the flat places under 27,000 feet, which Mr. Finch noted. A night in such a camp would be no more trying than a night at 25,000 feet. If the climbers, starting from 27,000 feet and after a good night fell in with reasonable weather, there seems little doubt that the remaining 2,000 feet could be ascended and the peak conquered, with a good prospect of a safe return on the same day

to the North Cole. There remains, of course, the possibility of physical breakdowns, such as happened to Major Morseid and Tejbjbier, but against this may be set the fact that Mr. Mallory, Mr. Somerville, Mr. Norton, Mr. Finch, and Captain Bruce had great altitudes and after-south severe physical labor, were not especially distressed, and suffered no bad effects afterwards. The conquest of Everest will always remain one of the most difficult adventures which man can undertake. But it is a reasonable adventure and not a piece of crazy foolhardiness, which could only succeed by the help of the one chance in a million. The two reconnaissance expeditions have shown that for its achievement, every available human resource is necessary.

but granted the utilization of these resources and the possibility which our familiarity with the lower slopes may soon permit of waiting upon a spell of kindly weather the ultimate conquest would seem to be assured the secret of everest has been solved we now know that there is a way to the top and we know what that way is end of chapter nine this reading by stephen sidle End of the Last Secrets by John Buckin.