Watkins Last Journey

Watkins' Last Expedition. By F. Spencer Chapman. ((hime

• and Windus., 12s. ad.) ' AT the conclusion of the British Arctic Air Route Rxpedition, led by Gino Watkins in 1931 and so well described by the author of this present book in Northern Lights, Watkins had many ambitious plans for the future. He wanted very Much to sledge across the South Polar plateau from the

Weddell Sea to the Ross Sea, taking aeroplanes with him, in order to find out if the Antarctica were one continent or two. Failing that he planned that he himself, Rymill and

the author should go right round the Arctic circle with kayak and dog-sledge, a journey which would have taken three ,ears or more and which would have been a splendid oppor- tunity for !napping mush Arctic territory that had previously been inaccessible and unknown. Unfortunately he found himself up against the one thing which had, not troubled him while leading the wild life he loved—money. The Arctic Air Route expedition had cost £13,000, and it seemed likely that either of his new schemes, especially the Antarctic, must cost almost as much or perhaps more. But he was Convinced that money would be found : so convinced with regard to the Antarctic scheme that he gave up the Arctic plan, though reluctantly. It turned out that money was not forthcoming at all. After a year of fatiguing disappointment and scheming Watkins managed to raise only .£800 : and this in such a way that he was really bound to the people who advanced it.

These facts are worth mentioning because they seem to indicate that every circumstance was working against.

Watkins : it was almost as if the expedition had not to take place. And it is bitterly-ironical that, after all his desperate scheming, Watkins should have been drowned almost before the expedition had begun and still more ironical that he should have been drowned by an- "accident in a laYak, the ; navigation and tricks of which he had learnt like a native4 The kayak is a long, extremely narrow and light craft, like a slender canoe, into which it is just possible for one man to squeeze himself ; it is both a sporting and hunting craft -1 that is, it is used not only for necessity, but for trick work, for pure amusement. The greatest of kayak tricks, though a necessary one, is the roll, by which it is possible for the navi- gator to turn clean over in the water and come up again without • upsetting himself or the craft. Watkins was,

extremely proficient at this, and so capable in Etkaygic that he almost always hunted althie. How he came to drown is a mystery. For some reason, perhaps because of superficial newspaper reports, we hack.gained the impression that he was drowned While actually rolling a icayak. But there is no proof of this. Only the simple fact rernains : that he was killed

almost before this expedition, like his own life, had begun. . And his death, it seems to me, has taken something away from this book. After his death the remaining members of the expedition decided, rightly, to go on with their work, and this hook is mainly an account of their journeys and surveys in the Angmazssalik district, with remarks on its flowers; birds, people, customs and weather. It is a great tribute to

the three men that, though three is the minimum safe number for most Arctic work, and that one of that number had to

stay at the base to record the weather, they came back with their work - completed. They were very often in danger.

Mr. Chapman does. not hesitate to say when they were afraicb knowing very well that fear is inseparable from courage though it is typical of him and his kind that he never mentions

when they *ere courageous: Andthey were OftencOurageous;

Even so, something is lacking. Indubitably it is the spirit of the man who died ; the spirit of which Mr. Augustine Courtauld speaks in bis excellentPreface : '

" He went neither for adventure nor for fame, nor for science, but because he wanted to do what he -did. It was the life he loved. If there is little about him in these pages it is because he died so soon. Such is the way with men of his spirit who cannot accept defeat when.their plans fail, who ask no help where

aerie is offered." '

Reading that, one realizes how hard it must have been to write some part, if not all, of this book. And to say that the hook is not only worthy of Watkins, but a tribute and a lAcmorial to him also, is to give it the kind of praise that at

least :these men will understand: .. -IL E: BATES: -