THE DISCOVERY OF THE SOUTH POLE. T HE speed with which

news reaches us from the South Pole is remarkably different from the do* arrival of most of the stories of North Polar exploration. When Sir Ernest Shackleton reaohed a point 111 miles from the South Pole in 1.909 we heard of his achievement within two months, and we have just learned of Captain Amundsen's story within three months of his triumph. It still seems possible, however, that Captain Scott may have reached the South Pole before Captain Amundsen, for although Captain Amundsen found no traces of his having done so it is to be remembered that the Pole is a vague point, and it would be possible in a region of mists and snowstorms for such fragile tokens as it is possible for explorers to leave behind them to be totally obscured unless later visitors happened actually to stumble across them: Nevertheless we do not suppose there is really much chance that the discovery of the South Pole will be placed to the credit of Great Britain. All one can say is that the possibility need not be dismissed. It is certain that if it turns out that the South Pole, as well as the North Pole, has eluded British explorers, Englishmen will be able to con- sole themselves very well with the reflection that the honours have fallen to such friendly and enterprising countries as the United States and Norway. Captain Amundsen has our heartiest congratulations.

Little need be said of the fact that he kept secret for what seemed an unnecessarily long time his intention of making a'dash to the South Pole. In Englishman would probably have preferred to announce his intention at once, even in the circumstances in which Captain Amundsen found himself. But no country in the world can claim a right to have the lino kept clear in order that an explorer who has already asso- ciated himself gallantly with unknown regions may make another attempt unchallenged: Sentiment might be entranced by such a procedure ; but, after all, as polar exploration is

worth while almost entirely for its scientific results, it ought to be gladly acknowledged by all the world whenever and by

whomsoever it is undertaken. To grudge any one the honour of being the first to arrive at the Pole is to pay more honour to the form than to the substance. Moreover, it appears that Captain Amundsen had for some time contemplated a journey to the Antarctic, though he did not happen to say anything about it. The fact appears to be that he went to the South Pole only in order to attract attention to his work and raise money, which was being too slowly collected, to continue the labour of many years in the Arctic Circle. He started for the North Pole, in a word, rid the South Pole. It was not till his ship had sailed as far as Madeira that he informed his comrades that he was bound south first of all. And when the world exclaimed upon this apparently sudden resolve, and suggested

that it was unfair to Captain Scott, whose design to reach the South Pole had been announced plainly long before,

Captain Amundsen said that he had made up his own mind

to go to the South Pole as early as September 1909. "I have often wished," be wrote, "that Scott had known of my decision,

so that it might not appear as if I wished to steal my way down yonder without his knowledge in order to get the start of him ; hut I have not risked to make it public in any form, fearing that I might then be prevented." Captain Scott did not know of Captain Amundsen's plan till Febrnary 1911, when he came across the ' Pram ' (Dr. Nansen's old ship, of course) establishing winter quarters in the Bay of Whales.

Captain Amundsen was already known to he an explorer, not only of extraordinary daring, but of singular resource and skill, and an explorer with a notable power of organization.

In his little vessel of forty-seven tons he had verified the fact, long before assumed by science, that the magnetic pole was a shifting point. He is now barely forty years of age. He began life as a medical student, but a love for the sea over- came all the dictates of prudence, and he taught himself navigation while serving before the mast of a whaling ship. Among other things he has realized the dream of generationa of Arctic explorers by sailing through the North-West Passage.

Many readers of Sir Ernest Shackleton's narrative of how he reached a point about 111 miles from the South Pole in January 1909 must have felt that the next expedition which was well organized as to its food supply, and had ordinary luck, must make a certainty of reaching the Pole. For when Sir Ernest Shackleton was forced to turn back he was on a high plateau which rendered travelling tolerably simple, and which had every appearance of stretching away unbroken to the Pole. Sir Ernest Shackleton was defeated solely by a want of supplies. When his last surviving pony fell into a crevasse and disappeared for ever his attempt was finished. His small party suffered terribly from want of food on the return journey. But Captain Amundsen had no Emelt experiences. His party was larger, his food supply was greater, his means of transport were better. There does not

appear to have been a day when he and his comrades endured the pangs of hunger. Even the dogs which returned

front the Pole were too dainty to touch the seal-flesh that was

offered to them in plenty on their arrival at the winter base. They were in very different case from Sir Ernest Shackleton and his men, who on some days could hardly lift their feet from the ground through weakness, and with whom the

thought of food became an obsession, even a mania, occupying their conversation and mingling with their dreams. Again, Captain Amundsen had better luck with the weather. Sir Ernest Shackleton's party were compelled to waste several

days lying in their tent during blinding blizzards, doing no- thing better than chafe their limbs to stave off frost-bite. Sir Ernest Shackleton on his journey towards the Pole had three men besides himself, four ponies, and four sledges. Captain Amundsen employed four men besides himself, four sledges, and fifty-two dogs. Captain Scott in 1902 had only two men besides himself, four sledges, and nineteen doge. Captain Amundsen has been jastified in his use of dogs. There were places where the crust of snow was so brittle that the greater weight of ponies would have been a serious disadvantage.

The great feature of Captain Amundsen's journey Was that he took a different route from that of Sir Ernest

Shackleton. It is believed that Captain Scott has followed the Shackleton route. This route is full of difficulties. The chief trouble is the Beardmore Glacier. On twelve

days Sir Ernest Shackleton travelled no more than five miles, and one day was spent in covering about six hundred yards. Yet it might have been expected that Captain Amundsen would choose a route of which the difficulties, however great, were ascertained and surmountable rather than face obstacles that might be much worse. His more easterly route, which entirely avoided the Beardmore Glacier, thoroughly justified his daring originality and his confident deductions from the observations of Sir Ernest Shackleton and Captain Scott. Sir Ernest Shackleton on starting from the Ross Barrier left South Victoria Land to the west and climbed by the enormous Beardmore Glacier to the Polar Plateau, which he named King Edward VII. Plateau. Captain Amundsen started from the Ross Barrier, at a point about four hundred miles further east, and climbed up to the Polar Plateau by a route which, as we said, avoided the Beardmore Glacier altogether. He had other glaciers to scale, but they were easier, and at the worst part of the journey he had eighteen dogs left. He was happier indeed than Sir Ernest Shackleton, who at his worst point had only one pony left, and was soon to lose even that. On December 6th Captain Amundsen had reached the plateau, and eight days later was at the Pole. He named the plateau round the Pole King Haakon's Plateau, and it will be a nice point to decide later whether the whole Polar Plateau, which seems to be at an average altitude of about 10,000 feet, is not covered by the name King Edward VII. Plateau bestowed by Sir Ernest Shackleton.

The additions which Captain Amundsen has made to our geographical knowledge are considerable. It seems probable now that South Victoria Land is connected with King Edward VII. Land. Another point, as Dr. Nansen points out in the Daily Chronicle, which paper also published Captain Amundsen's narrative, is that there is probably a connexion between the vast chain of the newly named Queen Maud Mountains and Queen Alexandra Range. The former range rises to 15,000 feet and stretches south-eastwards into the unknown, probably to the other side of the Pole in the direc- tion of the Weddell Sea, south of South America. The Ross Barrier is now shown to be a vast frozen mass floating in a great bay formed by South Victoria Land and King Edward VII. Land. The Barrier is fed from the glaciers of the mountain ranges, and these glaciers must originate on the Great Polar Plateau, which is nothing but the huge ice cap of the Antarctic: We may abandon the theory that there are two Antarctic continents divided by a channel.