THE NORTH POLE.
IT is sufficiently odd that in the eager controversy which divides the British public on the subject of Arctic enter- prise opinions are apparently wholly unconnected with interests. All those who would have to bear the suffering and risk of an attempt to reach the North Pole, even including the most eminent friends of the Arctic explorers who would feel most keenly the pain of any calamity, are almost unanimous in favour of the expedition ; while those who would merely have to look on, to receive the intelligence and discuss the results of such an expedition, or at most to contribute their aid to succour it, if there should be need, are, if the Times be a true index of public opinion, vehemently opposed to it. Captain Osborn's lucid and practical sketch of the best plan of operations for reaching the North Pole at the Geographical Society on Monday night, which received the cordial assent of so many experienced men and so many distinguished thinkers, has already been met with that pertinacious and even angry opposition wherewith for some reason or other the Times has traditionally pursued these noble attempts to add to a department of knowledge which can only be extended at some risk to human life and happiness. We should be sorry to think that these bold enterprises of great men, these efforts to buy a little knowledge at a great price, excite opposition for the same reason for which lazy and selfish persons fret at the exhibition of great energy and great heroism in others, namely, because they are a silent reproach to the ascendancy of selfish habits of thought. It would be unfair to affirm this ; but it is certainly perplexing to find the most contemptuous estimate of the results of possible discovery, and the highest estimate of its dangers and sufferings, amongst those who know least about those dangers and nothing about those sufferings. Captain Osborn has shown that out of 42 expeditions to the Polar Seas by ship, boat, and sledge between 1818 and 1854, only 128 men and two ships have been lost. Forty thousand miles have been explored, the magnetic pole reached, many striking results with respect both to the natural history of those regions and the scientific laws which govern the deviation of the magnetic needle and the Arctic and equatorial currents, attained, at a sacrifice scarcely greater than was involved in the loss of a single ship the other day,—Her Majesty's ship Racehorse,—far less than was due to a single explosion in the Hartley Colliery, and immeasurably less than results from sending squadrons to the unhealthy waters of China and the West Indies. Of course a single naval engagement of any magnitude would result in all probability in a much greater loss of life. If Captain Osborn had entered into the service of the Emperor of China more men would certainly have perished in one season,—possibly indeed for a higher end, possibly also for a very much lower one,—than the Arctic enterprises have cost during thirty-six years. So far as the mere cost of life goes it is scarcely possible to find any region of action in which far greater sacrifices are not made every year. Look at any of the blue-books on the health-tables of the less healthy manufacturing operations, mining, dress-making, artificial flower-making, pin-making, lace-making, China painting, and the rest,—which of them has not cost a far greater per-centage of lives—indeed some have also caused a vast moral degradation as well—than Arctic exploration during the thirty-six years spoken of by Captain Osborn ? And some at least to what purpose ? To gratify not one of the highest instincts of man, but some of the lowest,— to minister to effeminate vanity or the mere love for ex- pensive ornament. Yet if any one protested solemnly against a manufacture because it would cost the eyes or the lungs of thousands, what would the common sense of the world say? Would it not cry out that there is no limit to cowardly calculations of this kind, that men must be allowed to estimate for themselves the risks and the gains of such occupations, or we should have public opinion interfering to hamper the intellectual and physical energy of the world in every direction? Is a law to be laid down on the subject? Ought genius and enterprise to multiply the value of the results they hope to attain by the chance of attaining them, and only venture their lives if they think the product more than equal to the happiness its relinquishment would ensure ? Should Columbus have desisted in case his Mends had persuaded him that he was worth more to them than the hundred-thousandth part of the value of a new hemisphere if discovered ? Should Sir Isaac Newton have composed his mind, given up his exciting days and nights of meditation, and abandoned his lunar theory and suspected law of gravita- tion, because he knew it would unhinge his nervous system and had very little sound reason for expecting success ? It is in fact exceedingly shallow nonsense to try and reason a world which will risk life freely not only for honour, and science and riches, and pleasure, but for every fancy, folly, and vice, into the conviction that one of the highest and noblest in- stincts of man—the desire to know all that can be known of his own dwelling-place, is an instinct to be snubbed and bridled rather than admired and aided.
But the opponents of Captain Osborn's scheme for pene- trating to the North Pole will say that they do not propose to restrain the individual freedom of these Arctic explorers, but only to withhold the consent and aid of the Government,—te refuse the ships and the advantage of naval discipline and habits, to a scheme which promises to be fruitless of practical result. They will urge that though men should be left free for all such services of voluntary danger, whether on behalf of a noble or ignoble cause, each man who is asked for aid must give or refuse it on his own estimate of the risk and worth ; and, if individual men, then also individual governments. The Government should vote national money only to works of national importance. The navy should employ its resources only in projects which will raise the value of the navy for its proper work—that of naval war. " Grant," they will say, " that Captain Osborn's scheme is a nobler use of his powers and life and that of those who choose to follow him than ninety-nine-hundredths of men make,—still Government must not give its aid unless it sees a national object commensurate with the risk,—nor the Admiralty unless it see a departmental object commensurate with the sacrifice." Well, that may be granted, but we confess that it seems to us a still weaker line of defence than the other. Surely in time of peace there can be to the- nation few more vivifying emotions than national pride in the noble competition to reach the bounds of our habitation and establish the vexed scientific questions which hang upon that enterprise. Look at the justifiable pride taken by all England in the partial success of Captain Spoke's and Captain Grant's journey to the sources of the Nile. That was a journey in which the danger to the individual explorers was vastly greater than to any individual explorers in the Arctic regions. One reads with profound wonder the long list of their escapes from fever, violence, treachery, and even savage friendship. It may be said that was the first step to- a permanent intercourse with new tribes of men, and to a new series of operations on the productive powers of a new natural world. Well, perhaps that may be so, but if the same dangers had been incurred only to learn the con- figuration of the African continent and the physical laws, such as those of rain-fall, heat, and animal life, which govern the interior of it, no one would have thought the enterprise less noble. The nation takes a pride in the energy, and the self-reliance, and the perseverance which could carry through such an enterprise for an intel- lectual end quite apart from the magnitude of the results. Whatever satisfies the laudable pride of a great nation in intellectual enterprise, and serves to make the name of Englishman dearer to us and more respected abroad, is, if it involves no injustice to others, a national object of the highest kind. The acquisition of knowledge, however fruitless, is in itself a noble object. If not, why should the Germans glory, as they do very justly, in the recent discovery of the physical con- stitution of the sun by means of spectrum analysis ? It is by no means likely that they can ever get at the sun or use their knowledge of its constituents for any practical purpose. The knowledge will never be more than intellectual. And yet, could any Government grant have contributed to the elabora- tion of this truly great discovery, no one would have raised a voice against it.
But in the case of Polar discovery the service is one of some sacrifice and danger? No doubt, and that very element of sacrifice and danger is the great departmental reason why the Admiralty should welcome Captain Osborne proposal. Nothing 'contributes so much to elevate the spirit and strengthen the discipline of the service as enterprises which require precisely the same moral qualities as naval warfare and hold out even nobler prizes, when the country is at peace, that inspire emulation and enthusiasm, tend to make the men proud of their service and their commanders, train them in fortitude, courage, and presence of mind, and all without involving one of the great moral evils of war. We cannot conceive of an Admiralty in its senses not willing to meet half-way those who volunteer in time of peace on such a ser- vice as this.
Finally, though we do not insist so much on this view of the subject, and think it altogether subordinate, it is very far indeed from impossible that the results of such an expedition should be of high practical as well as intellectual importance. It is certain that Dr. Kane's expedition found a far better climate and higher temperature north of 78 deg. 37 min. than it did south of it. While the southern excursion brought them into bleaker and colder climates and amongst Esquimaux who travelled northwards to avoid the severity of the weather, the northern expedition came across by far the most genial spot yet found in these regions. The shores of the bay into which the river called by Dr. Kane " the Mary Minturn River" flows, are described by him as far the most pleasant and luxuriant spot in these regions. Many flowers, "a beautiful carpet of lychnis and ranunculus," on the banks of a flowing river, is not a common sight in Arctic voyages even in August,—and yet Dr. Kane found such a spot not far from 80 deg. north latitude. If the suggestions of scientific men that the upward heat- currents from the equator, which of course must all meet in the Tole, would create a warmer temperature at that point and not improbably an open sea, should be verified, the Pole will certainly prove far the most interesting spot in the Polar regions, and what law of isothermal lines and even of zoolo- gical and vegetable life might it not reveal ? It is certain that its discovery would extend our knowledge of magnetic laws, and that the measurement of a degree at the Pole would be a permanent addition to the physical theory of the earth, while the possibilities of the discovery are innumerable. When we consider how little and useless is the ordinary life of ordi- nary men, to speak of risk for such objects as these as fruit- less risk, seems to us to show crass ignorance at once of the relative meaning of words, and of the true significance of mortal existence.
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