It In and as many others know also. was Captain Scott's settled intention before leaving England to send a party of six under Lieutenant Campbell to King Edward VII Land simply in order to make a thorough exploration of that region and nothing more. the cablegrams the number of men taken for this eastern expedition is not stated, nor is the name of the officer in charge; but there is every reason to believe that Captain Scott is simply adhering to his original scheme, and it is altogether wrong to assume that this small party is being set to push forward to the pole as a kind of second string. Neither its number nor its equipment would justify any such object. It may be taken as certain that all the attempts made by this expedition to reach the pole will be led by the commander as long as he is alive and well. As to the Amundsen expedition, which is now evidently in close proximity to the British eastern party, it may accomplish some wonderful feat, and it apparently possesses more than three times the number of dogs that Captain Scott has with him; but it is very thin in men for a journey to the pole, especially if a new and untried route is to be tackled as is partly suggested by the landing-place. latter may be merely a ruse, and Captain Amundsen may simply have gone east in order to be out of sight of the Terra Nova, intending on landing and pushing south to work his way west and get on the known route as previously followed by Captain Scott and Sir Ernest Shackleton. This would hardly be in accordance with the etiquette of antarctic exploration; but Captain Amundsen may not concern himself much about this etiquette. When he left Norway it was understood that he was making not for the south pole but the north, and that it was his intention to proceed by way of Cape Horn and the Behring Straits This to a point of attack on the central arctic region from that quarter. When he reached Madeira, however, on his preliminary southward voyage, he announced that he had changed his plans and would make the south pole his objective instead of the other one, and that was the last that was heard of him until the Terra Nova found him snugly ensconced in the Bay of Whales. Whatever he may accomplish, his presence there certainly adds somewhat to the interest of the situation, though in all the circumstances it is difficult to regard him as a serious rival to Captain Scott for the highest honors of antarctic exploration. The commander of the British expedition is in a supremely determined mood, and all the knowledge we have serves to convince us that he is working on the right and the best lines, while his equipment is superior to anything that has ever been taken to the south before. When he returns from his two months' journey south, a journey which is in the nature of a trial spin-and he should be returning about the present time he will learn all about Captain Amundsen and his party in the east, for the Terra Nova when she returned westwards called in at McMurdo Sound and would leave a full statement. Amundsen can get no start of the British, for no land expedition could set off for the pole in February, and it must not be imagined from Captain Scott's brief statement of his intended sledge journey southwards towards the end of January that he might on that occasion attempt to reach the pole. He had no such intention and could not have, for the season was too far advanced. The time for starting on the main journey is October, and it will be next October that Captain Scott will proceed on his great quest with, as he explained to me, about twenty men, three teams of dogs, sev eral ponies, a motor, and three sledges. The party will gradually be reduced as the distance from the base increases, the men in the best physical condition being retained, and if all goes well, the final "dash" over the last hundred miles or so will probably be limited to about four men. The route and all its difficulties, except for this last hundred miles, are well known. Captain Scott on his former expedition with the Discovery first laid the foundations of it; Sir Ernest Shackleton extended it. Possibly Captain Scott may bear a little to the east of Sir Ernest's extension, and in this way he would have a line all his own from the base to the pole if he is fortunate enough to reach it. That, however, is a small point upon which no decision can be arrived at until the circumstances are considered on the spot. Whatever happens the commander hopes to reach the pole by Christmas. He will need to be back at his base by April when the winter begins. If this attempt should fail he will lie up in his winter quarters at McMurdo Sound until the next October and then make another effort. This is exactly how things stand in the antarctic at the present time. Nothing of the highest importance can be attempted for another six months, and apparently before that period elapses there will be a Japanese expedition in the same quarter ready to penetrate polewards -a very poorly equipped expedition, it is said. Some idea of the spirit animating the British expedition may be gathered from a few sentences included in a private letter which the writer reThe Outlook. ceived from Captain Scott just before his ship left New Zealand for the south. "The expedition flourishes," he said. "All preparations have worked out with extraordinary accuracy. We have re-examined, re-counted, re-sorted, re-stowed everything during our stay here, and have found all in good order. More satisfactory still is the spirit of enthusiasm which exists among the members of the expedition. I have never seen it equalled. We ought to do good work with such material, and we start with high hopes." From what I know of the writer of that letter and the conversations I have had with him, I think that if aviation had attained anything like its present standard of reliability at the time he left England last summer he would have included an aeroplane among his equipment, and made use of it if necessary. I say "necessary" because I believe he would prefer, if possible, to reach the pole by what we may call traditional methods, encountering and overcoming difficulties in the same way that the great explorers have always done. That aviation will come into the question if the present expeditions should unhappily fail, there can be little doubt. I know that Captain Scott did give serious consideration to the matter, and when he was at Bristol about a year since a free gift of a monoplane or biplane was offered him by a firm of manufacturers, but after some hesitation he declined it, properly regarding the science of aerial navigation at that time as being in an altogether too elementary state to justify him in any experiments in the antarctic. H. L. BOOKS AND AUTHORS. The $50,000 which was paid for a copy of the Gutenberg Bible at the recent sale in New York of the books collected by the late Mr. R. M. Hoe, makes a new high-water mark in book collecting. No such price was ever paid before for a single volume. Only seven copies of this Bible are known to be in existence. The last time one was sold, it brought $20,000. George Cary Eggleston's "What Happened at Quasi," which was noticed in this department two weeks ago, derives a melancholy interest from the fact that it was the author's last work, and consciously so, although conveying in its happy tone no suggestion of the circumstances under which it was written. Believing that he should not recover, Mr. Eggleston in a note dictated to his son, pathetically urged his publishers to hasten an advance copy that he might see the makeup of the book before he died. The fact that the dedicatory page was to bear a sketch of his little grandson added to his interest. It is pleasant to know that Mr. Eggleston received complete copies of the book while he was able to examine them critically, although his death occurred before the book reached the boy-public to which it was addressed. Henry Holt & Co. announce the publication of a new and important library of low-priced books, written with a common purpose of imparting information to the general reader, but covering a wide range of subjects. The series will be known as the Home University Library of Modern Knowledge, a title which well describes the books projected. The books will be written by specialists, but they are not meant for the reading of specialists but of laymen. They will appear in quarterly battalions of ten volumes, until at least one hundred volumes have been issued. The first ten volumes, promised for this month, include The French Revolution by Hilaire Belloc; The Irish Nationality by Mrs. J. R. Green; Shakespeare by John Masefield; A History of War and Peace by G. H. Perris; The Socialist Movement by J. Ramsay MacDonald, chairman of the British Labor Party; The Stock Exchange by F. W. Hirst, editor of the London Economist; Modern Biography by Dr. Marion Newnegin; Polar Exploration by Dr. W. S. Bruce, leader of the "Scotia" expedition; Parliament by Sir Courtenay P. Ilbert, clerk of the House of Commons; and The Evolution of Plants by Dr. D. H. Scott, late "keeper" at Kew Gardens. This enumeration will serve to indicate the scope of the series. It is perhaps one indication of a revived interest in Ireland, historically as well as politically, that several volumes on Irish history are to be published this season. One of the most important is Dr. Robert Murray's "Revolutionary Ireland and its Settlement," a work based on a fresh examination of the documents and bringing further light to bear upon the controversies of the time. It will be published by Messrs. Macmillan this month. Mr. Joseph R. Fisher's "The End of the Irish Parliament," which is announced by Mr. Arnold, covers the thirty years preceding the Union, and examines the causes that produced the Irish Rebellion, as well as the motives that led Pitt to abolish the Irish Parliament, and the means by which his policy was carried out. From the Oxford University Press we are to have "Ireland under the Normans, 1169-1216," by Mr. G. H. Orpen, and Mr. Elliot Stock has in the press the sixth volume of Mr. P. H. Hore's "History of Wexford." 1. The Lack of Privacy in the American Home. By Mary Mortimer V. Schubert's Songs. By Basil de Selincourt. IX. "The Old Yellow Book." TIMES 495 PUNCH 497 BLACKWOOD'S MAGAZINE 499 502 X. "An Inspired Little Creature." By Rosaline Masson XI. The Empire of Oil. XII. Owning Up. XIII. Phrases of the Feminine Fictionist. SATURDAY REVIEW 509 A PAGE OF VERSE XIV. The Doom of Sails. By Stephen Phillips FOR SIX DOLLARS, remitted directly to the Publishers, THE LIVING AGE will be punctually forwarded for a year, free of postage, to any part of the United States. To Canada the postage is 50 cents per annum. Remittances should be made by bank draft or check, or by post-office or express money order if possible. If neither of these can be procured, the money should be sent in a registered letter. All postmasters are obliged to register letters when requested to do so. Drafts, checks, express and money orders should be made payable to the order of THE LIVING AGE CO. Single Copies of THE LIVING AGE, 15 cents. THE DOOM OF SAILS Alas! must we utterly vanish, and cease from amidst us, Sails of the olden sea? Now dispossessed by the stern and stunted ironclad, Wingless and squat and stern? Purple sails of the heroes lured to the Westward, Spread for the golden isles! Sails of a magic foam with faery plunder, Wafting the wizard gold! Sails of the morning, come like ghosts on the sea-line, With midnight load of the deep! Sails of the sunset, red over endless waters, For the furthest Orient filled! Sails of the starlight, passing we know not whither, Silent, lighted, and lone! Sails of the sea-man accursed, and cruising for ever, Hoist by a spectral crew! Sails set afire by the lightning, re sounding to tempest, That drum and thunder and sing! Sails that unruffled repose on a bosom of azure, Glassed by a placid flood! Alas! must ye go as a dream, and depart as a vision, Sails of the olden sea? The Spectator. MY HEART SHALL BE THY GARDEN. My heart shall be thy garden. Come, my own, Into thy garden; thine be happy hours Among my fairest thoughts, my tallest flowers. Trom root to crowning petal thine alone. Thine is the place from where the seeds are sown Up to the sky enclosed, with all its showers. But ah, the birds, the birds! Who shall build bowers To keep these thine? O friend. the birds have flown. For as these come and go, and quit our pine To follow the sweet season, or, newcomers, Sing one song only from our alder-trees, My heart has thoughts, which, though thine eyes hold mine, Flit to the silent world and other summers, With wings that dip beyond the silver seas. Alice Meynell THE SLEEPERS. As I walked down Thames' stony side, This silent morning, wet and dark: Before the cocks in farmyards crowed, Before the dogs began to bark; Before the hour of four was struck By old Westminster's mighty clock: As I walked down the waterside, This morning, in the cold, damp air, I saw a hundred women and men Huddled in rags and sleeping there; These people have no work, said I, And long before their time they die. That moment, on the waterside, A lighted car came at a bound; I looked inside, and lo! a score Of pale and weary men that frowned; Each man sat in a huddled heap, Carried to work while fast asleep. Ten cars rushed down the waterside, Like lighted coffins in the dark; With twenty dead men in each car, That must be brought alive by work: These people work too hard, said I, And long before their time they die. William H. Davies. The Nation. SHEPHERD'S SONG. O black and white the shepherd's plaid That follows at my heel. O black and high the winter sky, Marna Pease |