Reading for Everybody.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVIII, Issue 2764, 19 March 1910, Page 3 (Supplement)

Reading for Everybody.

PEARY’S STORY.

Hltd GREAT JOURNEY TO THE NORTH POLE.

CHAPTER, v. As I watched the flag fluttering in the crisp air of the Pole I thought of the twenty-three ■ years of any own life which had been spent in labouring towards that goaf, and realised that at last I had made good. My most impelling desire when I knew' for a certainty' that I had reached my goal was for a little rest; •but after two or three hours'of absolutely fatigue-impelled sleep a state of mental exaltation made further rest impossible. For more than a score of years that mathematical point on the earth’s. surface had been the subject of any every ekort. To attain it I had dedicated my whole being, physical, mental, and moral; had risked tay life a hundred times, and the lives of those who had been glad to take the chances with me; had' given all my own money 7 and the •money of my friends. That last journey was my eighth into the Arctic. I had spent m those regions eighteen years of the twenty-three i between my thirtieth and my fifty - j third year. . ■ ’ !

It is with these phrases that Commander Peary begins his narrative; begins at tihe Pole itself. He has set out to tell t'he story of his expedition, but the overwhelming emotion of its climax dominated him at the outset, and it is of the Polo that he first speaks, of the thirty; hours he spent there full of the prosaic duties of his .expedition, but with the thrill of victory in his heart. We arrived at 90 north at ten o’clock in the morning of April 6. and we left there about four o’clock • in the afternoon of April 7. .During those thirty hours at the Pole I made the necessary observations for position, went some ten miles beyond my camp and some eight miles to the right of it, planted my flags, deposited my records, studied the horizon through myy telescope for possible land, and sought for a suitable iplaee to make a> sounding.

When he returns to the actual commencement of his task Commander Peary has to tell of many difficulties and disappointments. Returning in 1906 from an unsuccessful attempt to reach the Pole he at once set- to work to organise a new expedition. “I was already at an age .beyond which, perhaps with- the one exception of Sir John Franklin, no man had ever at- ' tempted, to prosecute work in the Arctic regions. I 'had to win now, or yield my dream and ambition for ever.” Progress was slow, funds reluctant to come iii; contractors .failed hint, a year’s delay ensued, the chief friend and financial supporter died. But patience held and friends were loyal. The ship was built and equipped. To each and all of those who accompanied him Peary pays affectionate tribute, to Marvin, his secretary, to Wardw-ell. chief engineer, to. steward and boatswain, to Matthew A. Henson, his negro assistant, who “can handle a sledge better, and is probably a better dogdriver, than any other man living, except some of the best of the Eskimo hunt-ere themselves.” And, beyond all, he honors i n his narrative Captain Bartlett: Blue-eyed, brown-haired, smoothshaven, and steel-muscled, Bartlett, whether at the wheel of the Roosevelt hammering a passage through ■the ice flees or tramping and stumbling over the ice pack with the sledges, or smoothing aivav tli9 troubles of the crew, he is always the same—tireless, faithful, enthusiastic, true as t'he -co in oars. • And now came the moment of departure. At one o’clock in the afternoon of July 6, 1908, the good ship Roosevelt left 'her moorings in New York,] Harbor for the North, amid immense enthusiasm. President Roosevelt, “the | biggest man America has ever produc- i ed,” bade the expedition farewell. In 1 going northwards- halts were made at one or two) places for supplies, until, leaving Sydney, Ca.pe Breton, the dash , into northern .seas began. Peary tells nc--.v of his sfcip:' I have a special affection for my little cabin of the Roosevelt'. Its size . and the comfort of the .bathroom adjoining were the oniy luxuries which i allowed myself. The cabin is plain, of -matched yellow pine painted white. Its conveniences are the evolution of long experience in the Arctic regions, ft lias a wide built-in bunk, an ordinary writing-desk, several 'book units, a wicker chair, an office chair, and a chest of drawers. The pianola .had been my pleasant companion on the previous voyage. . The strains of “Faust*’ rolled cut over’ the Arctic Ocean more often than any other. Marches and songs were also- popular, with the “Blue Danube Waltz”; and sometimes, when "the. spirits of my party were at rather a low ebb, I played ragtime pieces, which they especially enjoyed. On July 26 the Arctic Circle was crossed, and Cape York, -Greenland, reached on .the first day of August. Here Peary was once imore amo mi the Eskimos, some c f whom were to accompany him. . The last traces of civilisation were now left behind. Cape York . is the dividing line between- the civilis- j ed world on. the one. side and the Arctic world on the other. “Behind me lay the civilised; world, which could give ane nothing more. . . . On leaving •Cape York we had exchanged the mul- , tifarious purposes of civilisation for j the two purposes for which there is : room in those wide wastes; food for j man and dog and the covering of miles j of distance.” ;

Ahead of me lay—my dream, my destiny, the goal of that irresistible impulsion which had driven me for twenty-three years to hurl myself, time after time, against the frigid No of the Great North.

THE AIRSHIP.

MY VISIT TO THE CLEMENTBAYARD WORKS.

(By H. Hamilton. Fyfc, in the “Daily , Mail.”) PARIS. Outside, the Seine flowed grey and sluggish m tbe damp, depressing air. Dirty mist hung in sordid wreaths over the stream. At no time is the Quai I Michelet the sort of place at which one would long to spend a- holiday. On this day of January gloom and dankness it offered one of the least attractive prospects I have ever seen. . At last the taxicab which, had brought me from the boulevards to Le-vallois-Perret jerked itself to a stop before a vast building, and the driver, twisting his head round with that odd motioin of taxicab chauffeurs, looked in at the window and said, “Here ve are, monsieur; Eta-blissement ClemenoBayard. I worked here for ten yea.s. If monsieur permits, I will go to exchange a grip of the hand with my old foreman and comrades.” | I. J Without delay M. Guillelmon, the j manager, receives me with a cordial i greeting, and introduces me to M. j fc'abaticr, the engineer in charge of the ! great airship, which is to- make the J journey from Paris to London. Two re- | markable yo.ung men, these. The one keen, active, businesslike, an admirable type of the modern French homme d’- ; affaires. The other, a brilliant com- ' bination of scientific and practical abil- ; ity. In his pale, delicate face, with its high-bred, aquiline nose and deep, : thoughtful eyes, one can read the character of a man who is always brooding over the problems of his profession. He has been studying dirigible balloons for many years, ever since his student days. He has made over thirty as-

cents in them. Now, with gentle pride, he leads me into the enormous shed where the nacelle, or car of the airship lies. The first impression you would get, if you did not know what it was, would be that a battleship' wps in course of construction here. In the middle are the engines, the captain’s bridge, the pessengers’ deck. Forward and backward from these sweep long, harmonious lines' of metal. In front the framework, fifty yards long in all, ends in a. .pointed nose with a strong light attached to it for signalling. At the rear are the .great rudders, worked; by two wheels on the bridge. These govern both the direction and the upward or downward movement. Let me note now, as an indication of the precautions which have been taken i:i every respect,. that the wires which work the rudders are in duplicate, with separate pulleys, and with an ingenious contrivance for clipping them down into the plilleys, so that t’he.y cannot break loose. 11.

Most impressive of all are the gigantic propellers. High up on either side of the engines they harm smooth and shining. .Of polished walnut they are made, by Chauviero, the famous, designer or helices; and covered with a special varnish which prevents them fom being weakened by wet. Nearly twenty feet long they are, more than three time- the height of an exeptienally tall man. You can see their power b v the hurtling ipast of pieces of paper and waste when they are set going. The wind they create is tremendous. Yet. so- cleverly are they placed that on the bridge on feels very little of it. I did not oven have to hold my hat on. Another surprise I had when the engines were started—the two beautiful motors of 130-h.p. ea-ch. There was scarcely any vibration. Then M. Sabatier pointed out tbe springs on which each motor is hung, just like very strong carriage springs. These keep the corrugated iron floor of the car steady. They cannot, however, prevent it 'from being cold to- the feet. For the London voyage two or three pairs of socks, and 1 snowboot s over ordinary boots with thick soles, will be necessary to the passenger's comfort. 111. Upon the bridge I try. to imagine myself pilot. In front of me are six dials. Three are for registering the consumption of petrol and lubricant. Tbe huge petrol tanks are at the back of the bridge, over the passenger deck, containing enough essence for -a twen-ty-hour voyage with both motors at work and an average speed of thirtyfive miles, or for forty hours with one motor and a twenty-eight mile speed. Two- of the instruments are barometers, and the sixth is a •'‘clinometer,” which tells whether the balloon is up or down. In addition there are two machines which record the “pull” of the propellers. From tbe bridge also the electric lamps on the- airship ar© switched on or off, and the admission of air to the balloonet—the air-bag inside the gas-hag—is regulated. The same contrivance could be used fo r . filling airhags if the -airship fell into the water. These would be thrown out to support her and could keep her afloat, it is calculated, for many hours. Further, the pilot can give the mechanics i below him directions by means of a pointer or a disc—“ease her,” “stop her,” “go ahead,” and so on, exactly as on shipboard. It is marvellous to think that this great vessel, built so stoutly, and -with every convenience about her, voyaging in the sky. And the marvel is imtensi--fied by the fact that in another part of the shied they are putting together an aeroplane, quite as an ordinary everyday affair I become impatient. I want to start at once. I long for the day when the airship sails over London and drou-'i to earth at Worm-wood Scrubs, where “The Daily Mail” shod awaits it. What a moment that will be!

IN THE GRIP OF THE CROCODILE

An interesting article, entitled “Crocodile Reminiscences," written by Air. A. Cevendish. appears in the current number of “Chambers’ Journal,” from which we quote the following:— It was only a- few months since the incident happened that I am about to relate. My work took me on a visit up a river to one of those timber-cutting camps where are felled and rafted the great hardwood logs so valued in the Chinese market. G., the white man in charge, was a characteristic “hard

case,” who had started life before- the : mast in a sailing ship, and drifted in a beach-combing fashion to our colony, where he had beeii given, almost m charity, a subordinate billet in one of the large timber companies. Arriving in my uoat at the little, jetty or land-ing-stage, I was astonished to- find G. lying on a rattan couch, within a few yards of the bank, with a heavy express rifle across his knees, gazing intently at a rough pagar or fence erected in the stream. Hanging from this fence, and a few feet above the water, were, the corpses of a monkey and several pariah dogs; while half a dozen ducks, each tied to the fence by the leg with a long string, flapped about on the water and quacked dismally in their efforts to escape. I was just wondering whether the whisky bottle or too much solitude accounted for this state of affairs, when I noticed that G.’s leg was swathed in rough bandages from knee to ankle.

Throwing myself down near him in the. welcome shade, I learned the following story:—Two nights before G. was sleeping peasefully in his little palm-leaf house, in a clearing about twenty yards from the river bank, when his dog began to growl and refused to be silenced. G. turned out and walked round the hut to ascertain the cause of the disturbance, but, seeing nothing, addressed himself to the dog in his usual lurid and picturesque sailing-ship language, and retired to bed again. Five minutes later he was once more aroused by a yelp from the dog; and this time really annoyed, lie seized a stick and sallied forth to- inflict dire punishment on the disturber of his dreams. Suddenly a dark form glided swiftly from the shadows, and G. felt himself seized by the right knee as in a vice.

Stooping to free himself, lie found ho was in the grip of a large crocodile, whose teeth were firmly embedded in flesh and bone. Backwards and forwards the. struggle swayed—the crocodile. striving to pull its destined victim to the water’s edge, and G., hampered as he was by his imprisoned leg, fighting for his life to reach higher ground. At last, the beast, hurling its victim to the ground with a shake of its powerful head, began to drag him swiftly towards the water. Poor G., feeling, as he expressed it, that it was “all over bar the shoutin’,” determined to mako one last effort for his life ; and, taking advantage of a momentary halt as the brute was steering past a tree-stump, lie sat up and succeeded in getting both his thumbs into the reptile’s eye sockets—the onlv vulnerable part of a crocodile’s head.

The rest pf the story is perhaps best told .in. G.’s own words, or as nearly as circumstances (and the editor) will per. mit. “So as soon as I gets my thumbs made fast in ’is eyes, ’e opens ’is mouth, to shout, an’ lets go my leg. Then, first thing next mornin’ the coolies lays ’is breakfast for ’im, as -on see, an’ I gets into this chair, an’ ’ore I stays, if it’s a month.” Verily I tried to per_ suade G. to come away with me to the next station and see a doctor. I argued with him, I omplored him, but it was absolutely useless. He refused to move from that chair till lie bad banged bis crocodile, and I was at last obliged to leave him, having dressed his leg and exhausted every means of persuasion short of brute force. I met him again a. week later in a hospital bed, suffering severely, but quite- happy in the knowledge that the hones of that croc, were bleaching in the sun outside his house. Poor old G.! Only a few weeks afterwards the habit of clearing creepers from his. path in the jungle-with the butt-end of his loaded and cocked rifle proved fatal to him.