Nansen then set to work in earnest at his gigantic undertaking.
First of all a vessel must be designed,—one that would be able to defy the ice. Availing himself, therefore, of the services of the famous shipbuilder, Colin Archer, he had the Fram[1] built—a name suggestive of noble achievements to the youth of Norway.
On Oct. 26, 1892, she was launched at Laurvig. During the previous night the temperature had been fourteen degrees above zero, and a slight sprinkling of snow had covered valley and height with a thin veil of white. The morning sun peered through the mist with that peculiar hazy light that foretells a bright winter day.
At the station at Laurvig, Nansen waited to receive his guests. A whaler, with a crow’s-nest on her foretop, was lying in the harbor, to convey the visitors to the spot where the Fram was lying on the stocks.
In the bay at Reykjavik the huge hull of a vessel may be seen raised up on the beach, with her stern toward the sea. It is Fridtjof Nansen’s new ship that is now to be launched. She is a high vessel, of great beam, painted black below and white above. Three stout masts of American pitch-pine are lying by her side on the quay, while three flagstaffs, two of them only with flags flying, rear themselves up aloft on her deck. The flag which is to be run up the bare staff is to bear the vessel’s name—unknown as yet. Everybody is wondering what that name will be, and conjectures whether it will be Eva, Leif, Norway, Northpole, are rife.
Crowds of spectators are assembled at the wharf, while as many have clambered upon the adjacent rocks. But around the huge ship, which lies on the slips firmly secured with iron chains, are standing groups of stalwart, weather-beaten men in working attire. They are whalers, who for years have frequented the polar seas and braved its dangers, and are now attentively examining and criticising the new ship’s construction. A goodly number, too, of workmen are there,—the men who built the ship; and they are looking at their work with feelings of pride. And yonder is the vessel’s architect,—that stately, earnest-looking man with the long, flowing white beard,—Colin Archer.
And now, accompanied by his wife, Nansen ascends the platform that has been erected in the ship’s bow. Mrs. Nansen steps forward, breaks a bottle of champagne on the prow, and in clear, ringing tones declares, “Fram is her name.” At the same moment a flag on which the vessel’s name can be read in white letters on a red ground, is run up to the top of the bare flagstaff.
The last bands and chains are quickly removed, and the ponderous mass glides, stern first, slowly down the incline, but with ever-increasing velocity, toward the water. For a moment some anxiety is felt lest she should sink or get wedged; but as soon as her bows touch the water the stern rises up, and the Fram floats proudly on the sea, and is then at once moored fast with warps to the quay.
Crew of the Fram.