The North Pole Part 24

At the next camp I had another of the dogs killed. It was now exactly six weeks since we left the _Roosevelt_, and I felt as if the goal were in sight. I intended the next day, weather and ice permitting, to make a long march, "boil the kettle" midway, and then go on again without sleep, trying to make up the five miles which we had lost on the 3d of April.

During the daily march my mind and body were too busy with the problem of covering as many miles of distance as possible to permit me to enjoy the beauty of the frozen wilderness through which we tramped. But at the end of the day's march, while the igloos were being built, I usually had a few minutes in which to look about me and to realize the picturesqueness of our situation--we, the only living things in a trackless, colorless, inhospitable desert of ice. Nothing but the hostile ice, and far more hostile icy water, lay between our remote place on the world's map and the utmost tips of the lands of Mother Earth.

I knew of course that there was always a _possibility_ that we might still end our lives up there, and that our conquest of the unknown s.p.a.ces and silences of the polar void might remain forever unknown to the world which we had left behind. But it was hard to realize this.

That hope which is said to spring eternal in the human breast always buoyed me up with the belief that, as a matter of course, we should be able to return along the white road by which we had come.

Sometimes I would climb to the top of a pinnacle of ice to the north of our camp and strain my eyes into the whiteness which lay beyond, trying to imagine myself already at the Pole. We had come so far, and the capricious ice had placed so few obstructions in our path, that now I dared to loose my fancy, to entertain the image which my will had heretofore forbidden to my imagination--the image of ourselves at the goal.

We had been very fortunate with the leads so far, but I was in constant and increasing dread lest we should encounter an impa.s.sable one toward the very end. With every successive march, my fear of such impa.s.sable leads had increased. At every pressure ridge I found myself hurrying breathlessly forward, fearing there might be a lead just beyond it, and when I arrived at the summit I would catch my breath with relief--only to find myself hurrying on in the same way at the next ridge.

At our camp on the 5th of April I gave the party a little more sleep than at the previous ones, as we were all pretty well played out and in need of rest. I took a lat.i.tude sight, and this indicated our position to be 89 25', or thirty-five miles from the Pole; but I determined to make the next camp in time for a noon observation, if the sun should be visible.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CUTTING BLOCKS OF SNOW FOR IGLOOS AT NEXT TO LAST CAMP, 89 25' NORTH

(At This Camp It Was Difficult to Find Enough Snow for the Igloos)]

Before midnight on the 5th we were again on the trail. The weather was overcast, and there was the same gray and shadowless light as on the march after Marvin had turned back. The sky was a colorless pall gradually deepening to almost black at the horizon, and the ice was a ghastly and chalky white, like that of the Greenland ice-cap--just the colors which an imaginative artist would paint as a polar ice-scape. How different it seemed from the glittering fields, canopied with blue and lit by the sun and full moon, over which we had been traveling for the last four days.

The going was even better than before. There was hardly any snow on the hard granular surface of the old floes, and the sapphire blue lakes were larger than ever. The temperature had risen to minus 15, which, reducing the friction of the sledges, gave the dogs the appearance of having caught the high spirits of the party. Some of them even tossed their heads and barked and yelped as they traveled.

Notwithstanding the grayness of the day, and the melancholy aspect of the surrounding world, by some strange s.h.i.+ft of feeling the fear of the leads had fallen from me completely. I now felt that success was certain, and, notwithstanding the physical exhaustion of the forced marches of the last five days, I went tirelessly on and on, the Eskimos following almost automatically, though I knew that they must feel the weariness which my excited brain made me incapable of feeling.

When we had covered, as I estimated, a good fifteen miles, we halted, made tea, ate lunch, and rested the dogs. Then we went on for another estimated fifteen miles. In twelve hours' actual traveling time we made thirty miles. Many laymen have wondered why we were able to travel faster after the sending back of each of the supporting parties, especially after the last one. To any man experienced in the handling of troops this will need no explanation. The larger the party and the greater the number of sledges, the greater is the chance of breakages or delay for one reason or another. A large party cannot be forced as rapidly as a small party.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE HALT FOR LUNCH IN LAST FORCED MARCH, 89 25' TO 89 57', SHOWING ALCOHOL STOVES IN SNOW SHELTER

Left to Right: Henson, Egingwah, Ootah, Seegloo, Ooqueah]

Take a regiment, for instance. The regiment could not make as good an average daily march for a number of forced marches as could a picked company of that regiment. The picked company could not make as good an average march for a number of forced marches as could a picked file of men from that particular company; and this file could not make the same average for a certain number of forced marches that the fastest traveler in the whole regiment could make.

So that, with my party reduced to five picked men, every man, dog, and sledge under my individual eye, myself in the lead, and all recognizing that the moment had now come to let ourselves out for all there was in us, we naturally bettered our previous speed.

When Bartlett left us the sledges had been practically rebuilt, all the best dogs were in our pack, and we all understood that we must attain our object and get back as quickly as we possibly could. The weather was in our favor. The average march for the whole journey from the land to the Pole was over fifteen miles. We had repeatedly made marches of twenty miles. Our average for five marches from the point where the last supporting party turned back was about twenty-six miles.

CHAPTER x.x.xII

WE REACH THE POLE

The last march northward ended at ten o'clock on the forenoon of April 6. I had now made the five marches planned from the point at which Bartlett turned back, and my reckoning showed that we were in the immediate neighborhood of the goal of all our striving. After the usual arrangements for going into camp, at approximate local noon, of the Columbia meridian, I made the first observation at our polar camp. It indicated our position as 89 57'.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CAMP MORRIS K. JESUP, 89 57', APRIL 6 AND 7, 1909]

We were now at the end of the last long march of the upward journey. Yet with the Pole actually in sight I was too weary to take the last few steps. The acc.u.mulated weariness of all those days and nights of forced marches and insufficient sleep, constant peril and anxiety, seemed to roll across me all at once. I was actually too exhausted to realize at the moment that my life's purpose had been achieved. As soon as our igloos had been completed and we had eaten our dinner and double-rationed the dogs, I turned in for a few hours of absolutely necessary sleep, Henson and the Eskimos having unloaded the sledges and got them in readiness for such repairs as were necessary. But, weary though I was, I could not sleep long. It was, therefore, only a few hours later when I woke. The first thing I did after awaking was to write these words in my diary: "The Pole at last. The prize of three centuries. My dream and goal for twenty years. Mine at last! I cannot bring myself to realize it. It seems all so simple and commonplace."

Everything was in readiness for an observation[1] at 6 P.M., Columbia meridian time, in case the sky should be clear, but at that hour it was, unfortunately, still overcast. But as there were indications that it would clear before long, two of the Eskimos and myself made ready a light sledge carrying only the instruments, a tin of pemmican, and one or two skins; and drawn by a double team of dogs, we pushed on an estimated distance of ten miles. While we traveled, the sky cleared, and at the end of the journey, I was able to get a satisfactory series of observations at Columbia meridian midnight. These observations indicated that our position was then beyond the Pole.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE DOUBLE TEAM OF DOGS USED WITH THE RECONNOITERING SLEDGE AT THE POLE, SHOWING THEIR ALERTNESS AND GOOD CONDITION

(Each Dog had Received Nearly Double the Standard Ration of One Pound of Pemmican Per Day)]

Nearly everything in the circ.u.mstances which then surrounded us seemed too strange to be thoroughly realized; but one of the strangest of those circ.u.mstances seemed to me to be the fact that, in a march of only a few hours, I had pa.s.sed from the western to the eastern hemisphere and had verified my position at the summit of the world. It was hard to realize that, in the first miles of this brief march, we had been traveling due north, while, on the last few miles of the same march, we had been traveling south, although we had all the time been traveling precisely in the same direction. It would be difficult to imagine a better ill.u.s.tration of the fact that most things are relative. Again, please consider the uncommon circ.u.mstance that, in order to return to our camp, it now became necessary to turn and go north again for a few miles and then to go directly south, all the time traveling in the same direction.

As we pa.s.sed back along that trail which none had ever seen before or would ever see again, certain reflections intruded themselves which, I think, may fairly be called unique. East, west, and north had disappeared for us. Only one direction remained and that was south.

Every breeze which could possibly blow upon us, no matter from what point of the horizon, must be a south wind. Where we were, one day and one night const.i.tuted a year, a hundred such days and nights const.i.tuted a century. Had we stood in that spot during the six months of the arctic winter night, we should have seen every star of the northern hemisphere circling the sky at the same distance from the horizon, with Polaris (the North Star) practically in the zenith.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE RECONNOITERING PARTY AT THE POLE

(On the Sledge are Merely the Instruments, a Tin of Pemmican and a Skin or Two.) (Note the Firm Character of the Surface Ice. Snow Shoes Were not Required Here)]

All during our march back to camp the sun was swinging around in its ever-moving circle. At six o'clock on the morning of April 7, having again arrived at Camp Jesup, I took another series of observations.

These indicated our position as being four or five miles from the Pole, towards Bering Strait. Therefore, with a double team of dogs and a light sledge, I traveled directly towards the sun an estimated distance of eight miles. Again I returned to the camp in time for a final and completely satisfactory series of observations on April 7 at noon, Columbia meridian time. These observations gave results essentially the same as those made at the same spot twenty-four hours before.

I had now taken in all thirteen single, or six and one-half double, alt.i.tudes of the sun, at two different stations, in three different directions, at four different times. All were under satisfactory conditions, except for the first single alt.i.tude on the sixth. The temperature during these observations had been from minus 11 Fahrenheit to minus 30 Fahrenheit, with clear sky and calm weather (except as already noted for the single observation on the sixth). I give here a facsimile of a typical set of these observations. (See the two following pages.)

In traversing the ice in these various directions as I had done, I had allowed approximately ten miles for possible errors in my observations, and at some moment during these marches and countermarches, I had pa.s.sed over or very near the point[2] where north and south and east and west blend into one.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PEARY WITH CHRONOMETER, s.e.xTANT AND ARTIFICIAL HORIZON AT THE POLE]

[Ill.u.s.tration: PEARY TAKING AN OBSERVATION AT THE POLE, WITH ARTIFICIAL HORIZON, IN A SNOW SHELTER]

Photos by Henson, April 7

[Ill.u.s.tration: FACSIMILE OF OBSERVATIONS AT CAMP MORRIS JESUP, APRIL 7, 1909]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FACSIMILE OF OBSERVATIONS AT CAMP MORRIS JESUP, APRIL 7, 1909]

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE FOUR NORTH POLE ESKIMOS:

From Left to Right: Ootah, Ooqueah, Seegloo, Egingwah]

Of course there were some more or less informal ceremonies connected with our arrival at our difficult destination, but they were not of a very elaborate character. We planted five flags at the top of the world.

The first one was a silk American flag which Mrs. Peary gave me fifteen years ago. That flag has done more traveling in high lat.i.tudes than any other ever made. I carried it wrapped about my body on every one of my expeditions northward after it came into my possession, and I left a fragment of it at each of my successive "farthest norths": Cape Morris K. Jesup, the northernmost point of land in the known world; Cape Thomas Hubbard, the northernmost known point of Jesup Land, west of Grant Land; Cape Columbia, the northernmost point of North American lands; and my farthest north in 1906, lat.i.tude 87 6' in the ice of the polar sea. By the time it actually reached the Pole, therefore, it was somewhat worn and discolored.

A broad diagonal section of this ensign would now mark the farthest goal of earth--the place where I and my dusky companions stood.

It was also considered appropriate to raise the colors of the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity, in which I was initiated a member while an undergraduate student at Bowdoin College, the "World's Ensign of Liberty and Peace," with its red, white, and blue in a field of white, the Navy League flag, and the Red Cross flag.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PEARY'S IGLOO AT CAMP MORRIS K. JESUP, APRIL 6, 1909;

The Most Northerly Human Habitation in the World. In the Background Flies Peary's North Polar Flag Which He Had Carried for Fifteen Years]

After I had planted the American flag in the ice, I told Henson to time the Eskimos for three rousing cheers, which they gave with the greatest enthusiasm. Thereupon, I shook hands with each member of the party--surely a sufficiently unceremonious affair to meet with the approval of the most democratic. The Eskimos were childishly delighted with our success. While, of course, they did not realize its importance fully, or its world-wide significance, they did understand that it meant the final achievement of a task upon which they had seen me engaged for many years.

Then, in a s.p.a.ce between the ice blocks of a pressure ridge, I deposited a gla.s.s bottle containing a diagonal strip of my flag and records of which the following is a copy: