Page:Proposed Expedition to Explore Ellesmere Land - 1894.djvu/31

3 outfit. A workshop will be set up and gradually equipped with the appliances for producing all the traveling-gear needed. Each year supplies and recruits will be sent out, and any persons desiring to quit the Arctic will be sent back, by means of the whalers. (One whaling firm has offered to transport next year's party at the rate of $250 per man for the round trip.) At this station the recruits will receive their preliminary training, face to face with the problems to be solved, yet not exposed to risk.

If nothing more were done, an immense advantage would already be gained by having the base of operations at the very portals of the unknown region, only 960 miles from the Pole, instead of having it at New York or London. But, besides the primary station, it is proposed to push a fan of secondary stations into the unknown area, at first not much over 100 miles apart, until with growing experience the distance may be increased to 200 miles. The first requisite for each secondary station will be regular communication with the primary station. With the short distances between them, it is safe to say that each trip will become easier than its predecessor until it ceases to be a notable performance. Each secondary station is to have its comfortable house (also made cold-proof by magnesia packing), a spacious ice-house, several boats, ample provisions, furnished in the first instance from the primary station, and plenty of apparatus and ammunition for levying tribute' on the animal kingdom in the vicinity. The permanent force at each secondary station is never to exceed five in number. One of these is to devote his time primarily to scientific observations, the others to hunting. Only when the spoils of the chase have yielded them provisions for two years ahead will they be allowed to go exploring. No hunter, however, will at any time be without his note-book, his aneroid, and, if possible, his aluminum theodolite and pocket chronometer (to be supplied by Queen & Co., of Philadelphia), wherewith to map his route. So far as possible, none but men of scientific training will be admitted, so that nothing of value may pass unrecorded.

With stations 100 miles apart, each party of five will have 10,000 square miles of surface (about equal to the State of Vermont) to furnish its food supply. With 200 miles between the stations, the area will be 40,000 square miles (about equal to the