Sir Allen Young says, among other things: “Dr. Nansen assumes the blank space around the axis of the earth to be a pool of water or ice; I think the great danger to contend with will be the land in nearly every direction near the Pole. Most previous navigators seem to have continued seeing land again and again farther and farther north. These Jeannette relics may have drifted through narrow channels, and thus finally arrived at their destination, and, I think, it would be an extremely dangerous thing for the ship to drift through them, where she might impinge upon the land, and be kept for years.”
With regard to the ship’s form, Sir Allen Young says: “I do not think the form of the ship is any great point, for, when a ship is fairly nipped, the question is if there is any swell or movement of the ice to lift the ship. If there is no swell the ice must go through her, whatever material she is made of.”
One or two authorities, however, expressed themselves in favor of my plan. One was the Arctic traveller, Sir E. Inglefield, another Captain (now Admiral) Wharton, Director of the Hydrographic Department of England.
In a letter to the Geographical Society, Admiral Sir George H. Richards says, on the occasion of my address: “I regret to have to speak discouragingly of this project, but I think that any one who can speak with authority ought to speak plainly where so much may be at stake.”
With regard to the currents, he says: “I believe there is a constant outflow (I prefer this word to current) from the north, in consequence of the displacement of the water from the region of the Pole by the ice-cap which covers it, intensified in its density by the enormous weight of snow accumulated on its surface.” This outflow takes place on all sides, he thinks, from the polar basin, but should be most pronounced in the tract between the western end of the Parry Islands and Spitzbergen; and with this outflow all previous expeditions have had to contend. He does not appear to make any exception as to the Tegethoff or Jeannette, and can find no reason “for believing that a current sets north over the Pole from the New Siberian Islands, which Dr. Nansen hopes for and believes in. ... It is my opinion that when really within what may be called the inner circle, say about 78° of latitude, there is little current of any kind that would influence a ship in the close ice that must be expected; it is when we get outside this circle—round the corners, as it were—into the straight wide channels, where the ice is loose, that we are really affected by its influence, and here the ice gets naturally thinner, and more decayed in autumn, and less dangerous to a ship. Within the inner circle probably not much of the ice escapes; it becomes older and heavier every year, and in all probability completely blocks the navigation of ships entirely. This is the kind of ice which was brought to Nares’s winter quarters at the head of Smith Sound in about 82° 30′ north; and this is the ice which Markham struggled against in his sledge journey, and against which no human power could prevail.”
He attached “no real importance” to the Jeannette relics. “If found in Greenland, they may well have drifted down on a floe from the neighborhood of Smith Sound, from some of the American expeditions which went to Greely’s rescue.” “It may also well be that some of De Long’s printed or written documents in regard to his equipment may have been taken out by these expeditions, and the same may apply to the other articles.” He does not, however, expressly say whether there was any indication of such having been the case.
In a similar letter to the Geographical Society the renowned botanist Sir Joseph Hooker says: “Dr. Nansen’s project is a wide departure from any hitherto put in practice for the purpose of polar discovery, and it demands the closest scrutiny both on this account, and because it is one involving the greatest peril...
“From my experience of three seasons in the Antarctic regions I do not think that a ship, of whatever build, could long resist destruction if committed to the movements of the pack in the polar regions. One built as strongly as the Fram would no doubt resist great pressures in the open pack, but not any pressure or repeated pressures, and still less the thrust of the pack if driven with or by it against land. The lines of the Fram might be of service so long as she was on an even keel or in ice of no great height above the water-line; but amongst floes and bergs, or when thrown on her beam-ends, they would avail her nothing.”
If the Fram were to drift towards the Greenland coast or the American polar islands he is of opinion that, supposing a landing could be effected, there would be no probability at all of salvation. Assuming that a landing could be effected, it must be on an inhospitable and probably ice-bound coast, or on the mountainous ice of a palæocrystic sea. With a certainly enfeebled, and probably reduced ship’s company, there could, in such a case, be no prospect of reaching succor. Putting aside the possibility of scurvy (against which there is no certain prophylactic), have the depressing influence on the minds of the crew resulting from long confinement in very close quarters during many months of darkness, extreme cold, inaction, ennui, constant peril, and the haunting uncertainty as to the future, been sufficiently taken into account? Perfunctory duties and occupations do not avert the effects of these conditions; they hardly mitigate them, and have been known to aggravate them. I do not consider the attainment of Dr. Nansen’s object by the means at his disposal to be impossible; but I do consider that the success of such an enterprise would not justify the exposure of valuable lives for its attainment.
In America, General Greely, the leader of the ill-fated expedition generally known by his name (1881–84), wrote an article in The Forum (August, 1891), in which he says, among other things: “It strikes me as almost incredible that the plan here advanced by Dr. Nansen should receive encouragement or support. It seems to me to be based on fallacious ideas as to physical conditions within the polar regions, and to foreshadow, if attempted, barren results, apart from the suffering and death among its members. Dr. Nansen, so far as I know, has had no Arctic service; his crossing of Greenland, however difficult, is no more polar work than the scaling of Mount St. Elias. It is doubtful if any hydrographer would treat seriously his theory of polar currents, or if any Arctic traveller would indorse the whole scheme. There are perhaps a dozen men whose Arctic service has been such that the positive support of this plan by even a respectable minority would entitle it to consideration and confidence. These men are: Admiral M’Clintock, Richards, Collinson, and Nares, and Captain Markham of the Royal Navy, Sir Allen Young and Leigh-Smith of England, Koldewey of Germany, Payer of Austria, Nordenskiöld of Sweden, and Melville in our own country. I have no hesitation in asserting that no two of these believe in the possibility of Nansen’s first proposition—to build a vessel capable of living or navigating in a heavy Arctic pack, into which it is proposed to put his ship. The second proposition is even more hazardous, involving as it does a drift of more than 2000 miles in a straight line through an unknown region, during which the party in its voyage (lasting two or more years, we are told) would take only boats along, encamp on an iceberg, and live there while floating across.”