Page:Proposed Expedition to Explore Ellesmere Land - 1894.djvu/20

21 in all the Arctic that promises the largest results with the least amount of labor and danger. With a good boat and provisions for the party at the entrance of Jones Sound, four or six active young men should be able, with ordinary caution, to trace at least 300 miles of that unknown coast, in perfect safety, during a single summer. Coburg Island and Clarence Head are sighted every summer by the visiting whalers, and a trip thereto is no more dangerous than one to Point Barrow.

Engineer-in-Chief, U. S. Navy. 2em In regard to your proposed Arctic expedition, I am pleased to see you lay so much stress on the one point on which I have always insisted—that no step should be taken in Arctic exploration until you know that your depot of provisions is actually established. With a well-supplied depot to fall back on, and a good whaleboat, there is hardly a point of any coast of 300 to 500 miles that can not be reached with safety.

Since you propose to follow the coast line, you will encounter even less danger than we did in our retreat from the "Jeannette." In fact, if your expedition is well managed, nothing but a very unfortunate or unforeseen accident can prevent it from carrying out its entire program.

Director U. S. Geological Survey. 2em Your proposed expedition to Ellesmere Land, if carried out as planned, going up and returning by one of the whalers that annually pass by that land, and remaining not more than five months, with a depot of provisions sufficient for two years, seems feasible and safe. If your assistants are scientific men. the results can not fail to be of value. Geologists would be interested to know something of the structure of that land, thus far untrodden by a white man's foot.