Abstract
IN February, 1875, when the Arctic Expedition was being prepared, I asked the First Lord of the Admiralty, in Parliament, whether, in view of the small value for scientific purposes of isolated observations in the Arctic regions, in comparison with simultaneous observations at different places, and in view, also, of the interest now taken in Arctic science by foreign Governments, he would postpone for one season the departure of the proposed Arctic Expedition, and in the interval communicate with foreign Governments with a view to the organisation of other expeditions to make observations simultaneously with our own at fixed times? The First Lord said that he considered the preparations for an expedition too far advanced to admit of this, and added: “I should regard the project of combination with other powers to attain the objects in view as one beset with difficulties” in which, I think, he was in error. In the following month, when the Supplementary Estimate for the Arctic Vote was under discussion, I again drew the attention of the Government and Parliament to the advantages of simultaneous Arctic expeditions (see Hansard, vol. ccxxii. p. 1354), and in Naval Science for April of the same year, in an article on “Foreign Polar Expeditions,” I drew still further attention to the matter, concluding with an extract from a paper by Capt. Weyprecht (who so greatly distinguished himself in the Austro-Hungarian polar expeditions of 1871 and 1872-74), in which he pointed out in the clearest manner the desirability of extending future Arctic researches far beyond mere geographical exploration, and pressing forward with our studies of magnetism, electricity, the best of meteorology, &c. “The solution of these questions cannot,” he said, “be expected until all nations which claim to come up to the present high standard of civilisation unite to go hand in hand, setting aside all national rivalries. To bring about decisive scientific results it will be necessary to make a number of simultaneous observations, so conducted that they will furnish a yearly résumé of observations made in different parts of the Arctic regions with exactly similar instruments, and from exactly similar instructions.”
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REED, E. International Polar Expedition . Nature 17, 29–30 (1877). https://doi.org/10.1038/017029d0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/017029d0