| Show A FAIRY STORY TORY RUMORS THAT THE XORTH FOLE HAS BEEN FOUND t Norwegan Fins Alleged to Have Been Planted ThereFew However How-ever Believe the Story TRends T-Rends Like Romance ST PETERSBURG Feb 13A telegram tele-gram received today from Irkutsk Siberia says a Siberian trader named Kouchnareff an agent of Dr Fridtjof Nansen the Norwegian explorer who sailed in the Fram on June 24 1893 for the Arctic regions has received information that Nansen reached the North Pole found land there and is returning toward civilization In April the Figaro of Paris circulated circu-lated a rumor that Nansen had found the North Pole situated on a chain of mountains and planted the Norwegian flag there The story was generally regarded as without foundation On Sept 17 last year advices were received in London from a Danish trading station at Angmagsalik on the east coast of Greenland that a ship supposed to be Dr Nansens Fram had been sighted at the end of July stuck fast in the ice Finally in Dec 6 a dispatch from Christiana Norway Nor-way stated that Nansens wife received receiv-ed a letter by a carrier pidgeon reporting re-porting the expedition a doing well As no carrier pigeons were taken north by the Nansen party this report was evidently incorrect THE EXPEDITION sailed from Christiana on June 24 1893 the doctors plan being to make for the New Siberian islands and head north until the Fram by being imbedded imbed-ded in the ice would be compelled to drift along the west coast of any land which might be found On Aug 23 1895 Dr Nansen sent a dispatch from Vardor reporting that on the 2d of that month he was about to sail into the Kara sea and the Fram had behaved splendidly up to that stage of the jour I I ney especially In forcing her way I through the ice A London dispatch dated March 4 last year announced that a letter dated Kjolleatjord February 24 had reached Hammerfest Norway announcing an-nouncing that the telegraph inspector at a station in the mountains between Lebeay and Langefjord had seen a Walloon moving in a southerly direction and believed i was possibly carrying dispatches from Dr Nansen Until the foregoing dispatch no further news of the balloon or Dr Nansen has been received WHO HE IS Dr Fritjef Nansen is a distinguished scientist of Norway and an enthusiastic tic believer in the belever possibility of reach ing the north pole He is about 35 years of age He entered the university univer-sity of Christiana in 1880 and two years later went on a sealing trip to Denmark Den-mark straits on the east coast of Greenland in the Viking Later in 1882 Nansen was appointed curator at the museum at Bergen which position he retained until 1888 when he led a small expedition to Greenland crossing the southern part of that portion of the globe I was probably during this trip that Nansen conceived the plan of making an effort efort to reach the north pole in a vessel constructed especially for such an undertaking In any case after his return to Norway Nansen took the preliminary steps towards fitting out his expedition and the Fram was planned and constructed She is generally classed as a threemasted sailing schooner but she had a 160 horse power steam engine in addition to Tier sails Her displacement was 800 tons and her sides were so constructed construc-ted as to force all ice meeting the vessel ves-sel to pass underneath her thus preventing pre-venting pinching and screwing The Norwegian parliament allowed Nansen about 52000 to fit out his craft and in addition he was assisted in his work by many private subscriptions subscrip-tions including one of 5000 from King Oscar The Fram was launched October Octo-ber 25 1892 at Laurwik near Chris tiana A Norwegian paper describing the fitting out of the Fram said THE STAFF OF LIFE Bread Is the principal nourishment of Nansen and his people The bread is a kind of biscuit large and round white and very compact The ration of each man is to consist of four biscuits a day This at least was given out when the expedition left Norway Silk is used a the most suitable material for tents as i shuts out the cold better bet-ter than anything else The cabin of Nansens ship the Fram Forward is heated by means of an English petroleum stove which consumes three litres of petroleum per day As the explorer h taken along with him a sufficient supply of this fuel to last him eight or nine years there will be no lack of heating material ma-terial The library of the expedition consists of 1000 books half of which are scientific works and the other half novels etc The crew numbers twelve men and all occupy the cabin which measures only thirteen feet square There they dwell eat and work The suits they wear cannot be penetrated by water HIS COMPANIONS Dr Nansens companions were Captain Cap-tain Otto Sverdrup shipmaster Sigurd Scott Hansen lieutenant in the Norwegian Nor-wegian navy and director of the astronomical as-tronomical meteorology and magnetic observations Henrick Blessing surgeon sur-geon and botanist Theodore C Jacob sen mate Peder Hendriksen harpooner har-pooner Anton A Mundsen chief engineer en-gineer Lars Peterson second engineer engi-neer Hjalmer Johannson officer in the Norwegian army Bernard Nordahl electrician Ivan Mogatad carpenter and Adolph Juell steward < The following letter was received last year by Mr A Pain of Sheffield England Eng-land an arctic lecturer Christiana Sept l6The steamship Hertha freighted by the Danish government gov-ernment to bring victuals and furniture furni-ture to the Danish colony Angmegsa Ilk which was established last year on the coast of Greenland arrived there on August 25 Peterson the manager man-ager of the colony then reported that the different Esquimaux twice saw at the end of July a threemasted vessel stuck fast in the ice The ship had a short foremast I was first seen in the Sermtligakfjord 65 degrees 20 minutes min-utes north latitude 38 minutes longitude longi-tude They had seen aio smoke from the ship The report is quite trustworthy trust-worthy We can get go more until worth next year The Frams foremast was extraordinarily short so that the de sorsption agrees so far From the statement of the Esquimaux we should in that case not hear from the Fram tht until next year Meanwhile we must be patient and not feel quite certain that we have to do with the Pram HIS THEORY Dr Nansen according to Lieutenant David L Bralnerd U S A who accompanied ac-companied the Greely expedition as subsistence officer bases his theory of tHe current which he relied on to carry him through the Arctic regions on the fact that the trend of the Jeanette was generally in the direction of the pole and that pieces of drift etc have been found on the east and west coast of Greenland and along the east coast of Ellesmere and Grinnel land and from their appearance and character seem to indicate that they had drifted from the Siberian coasts Other articles such as a large stopper or plug for a powder pow-der horn a coasting stick a cane etc evidently the work of Alaskan Indians have also been found in the same place Therefore the supposition was advanced ad-vanced that they drifted across the 1ole down tho east coast of Greenland 0 1c 1 r f 1 and around Cape Farewell and up intO Bans Bay and Smiths Sound I was also recalled by Lieutenant Brainerd that the relics of the Jeanette left on the ice at the1 time sh was crushed were eventually found on the west coast of Greenland near Julians head From the time of the disaster and the time the relics reached there it was estimated that the relics must have drifted at the rate of about three miles mles a dayTOOK TOOK CHANCES But the lieutenant added Dr Nansen seems to have disregarded or at all events must have taken ills chances on a Important factor the baffling and uncertain nature of the current abut which nothing is definitely know I believe that not only will the Nan sen expedition prove a failure but that it will end In disaster I think it doubtful doubt-ful whether Dr Nansen will over be heard from think that he has had too little experience to cope with the difficulties he will Inevitably encoun er and especially with the ice |
