Chapter VIII: Part 8

Elisha Kent Kane, son of Judge John K. Kane, was born in Philadelphia, February 3, 1820. In his youth he displayed those qualifications of ceaseless activity, daring adventure, and strong personal courage which characterized his mature manhood. Inclined to all efforts involving physical hardships and contact with nature, his early education was devoted to civil engineering and such natural sciences as chemistry, geography, geology, and mineralogy. Unfortunately, in his sixteenth year, chronic and functional heart disease developed, which intermittently affected him through life and deterred him from the profession of an engineer. Applying himself to medicine, he graduated therein in 1842 at the University of Pennsylvania, in the meantime having served as a resident physician of the Pennsylvania Hospital. His inaugural medical thesis, based on personal experiments and observations, gave him a reputation which augured professional prominence. In 1843 he was appointed physician to the United States embassy to China, under Caleb Cushing, who was charged with the negotiation of a treaty with that country. At the way ports and during the tedious intervals of the treaty negotiations, Kane lost no opportunity of travel and adventure. With Baron Löe he visited the Philippine Islands and the volcano of Tael. Not content with the usual point of view, and despite the protestations of the native guides, he was lowered two hundred feet in the crater, whence he scrambled downward to the smoking sulphur lake and dipped his specimen bottles into its steaming waters. In his ascent the loose, heated ashes charred his boots and gave way under his feet, the sulphur vapors nearly asphyxiated him, he fell repeatedly, and was barely able to tie the bamboo rope around him. Drawn up in an exhausted condition, and carried to a neighboring hermitage, he barely escaped violence at the hands of the offended natives, who considered his rash feat a sacrilege.

Resigning his appointment with the legation, Kane established himself as a physician at Whampoa, on the Canton River, where illness shortly broke up his professional practice. Fortunately for his future fame he was unsuccessful in his application to the Spanish Government for permission to practise medicine at Manilla, and Kane returned to the United States by the way of Singapore, India, Egypt, and Europe, his journey marked by adventure and danger. In these, as in all other sea voyages, he suffered excessively from sea-sickness, which required all of his indomitable will to endure with equanimity.

In 1846 he was commissioned assistant surgeon in the United States Navy; his first sea duty took him to the west coast of Africa, where coast fever invalided him within ten months. His desire for active service was so great that before his health was re-established he obtained orders from the Secretary of the Navy to proceed to head-quarters of the army, then in the City of Mexico, for duty in connection with the collection of data relative to field hospitals and surgical statistics. Here his activity and daring resulted in his being wounded in a guerilla skirmish.

Assigned temporarily to a surveying vessel, circumstances soon determined Kane's career and gave full scope to his enthusiastic energies, and insured his future fame. The appeals of Lady Franklin, the recommendations of President Taylor, and the generosity of Henry Grinnell, had culminated in the organization of a search expedition for Franklin in the Arctic regions. It was provided that the vessels should be manned by volunteers from the Navy, and among those offering their services for this mission of humanity none was more importunate than Kane. Persistent efforts brought him orders for this fateful voyage while bathing in the tepid waters of the Gulf of Mexico, and ten days later he sailed from New York for the icy wastes of the North as surgeon of De Haven's flag-ship, the Advance. This search, known in Arctic history as the First Grinnell Expedition, was made under a joint resolution of the Congress of the United States, dated May 2, 1850, "to accept and attach to the Navy two vessels offered by Henry Grinnell, Esq., to be sent to the Arctic seas in search of Sir John Franklin and his companions." Two very small sailing brigs constituted the fleet, the flag-ship Advance, commanded by De Haven, an officer of Antarctic experience under Wilkes, and the Rescue, under Master Griffin; the entire party numbered thirty-three officers and men.

Their objective point was Lancaster Sound and its westward extension, Barrow Strait, whence either or both Wellington Channel and Cape Walker were to be visited. The squadron passed safely through Davis Strait, and skirting the dreaded land-ice of Melville Bay, reached Cape York after three weeks of constant and dangerous struggle with the heavy ice, which nearly destroyed the Rescue, borne almost on her beam-ends by the enormous pressure from a moving ice-pack. De Haven fell in with the English squadrons on the same errand, August 19, 1850, and, entering Lancaster Sound with his British consorts, devoted his energies to the search in hand. Griffin, of the Rescue, shared with Captain Ommaney, R. N., the honors of the discovery, at Beechy island, of the wintering-place of Franklin's squadron in 1845-46. Later three graves of members of Franklin's party were found, and numerous evidences of the good condition and activity of the expedition during that winter. About three weeks later, on September 10, 1850, De Haven concluded that the position attained was not sufficiently advantageous to justify his wintering, and so decided to return to the United States. Unfortunately, strong gales and very cold weather prevented immediate action, and in a few days both brigs were frozen immovably in an enormous ice-pack, where they were destined to drift helplessly to and fro at the mercy of the winds and currents for many months.

Beset in Wellington Channel, to the north of Beechy Island, the American squadron first found itself drifting slowly, but with alarming steadiness, to the north, into waters and along coasts that had, as far as they then knew, never been visited. The drift carried the Advance to latitude 75° 25' north, longitude 91° 31' west, and on September 22d they discovered new land, to which De Haven gave the merited name of Grinnell. It proved to be an integral part of North Devon, of which it was the northwestern extension. Every few days there was a partial breaking up of the pack and consequent danger of destruction. On one occasion, says Kane: "We are lifted bodily eighteen inches out of water. The hummocks are reared up around the ship, so as to rise a couple of feet above our bulwarks, five feet above our deck. They are very often ten and twelve feet high, and threaten to overwhelm us. Add to this, darkness, snow, cold, and the absolute destitution of surrounding shores." The temperature fell below zero and the ships seemed destined to winter in Wellington Channel, but fortunately a strong northwest gale, in conjunction with heavy tides, disintegrated the main pack and set ships, ice and all, southward into Barrow Strait. Here they fell under the action of a southeasterly current and, drifting all winter, passed slowly through Lancaster Sound into Baffin Bay, where the opening polar summer found them yet fast in the ice, from which the two brigs were freed off Cape Walsingham, June 5, 1851, after drifting in eight and a half months a distance of ten hundred and fifty miles. It is impossible to adequately describe their physical discomforts and dangers, the mental depression of the sunless midwinter of eight weeks, and the even harder experiences of the Arctic spring-tide, when excessive cold and increasing lassitude made steady inroads on their impaired constitutions. Kane tells us they were continually harassed by uncertainties as to their ultimate fate. Yesterday the unbroken floe, stretching as far as the eye could reach, seemed so firm and stable as to insure months of quiet, uninterrupted life. Today, the groaning, uneasy pack, yielding to an unseen power, split and cracked in all directions, throwing up huge masses of solid ice, that threatened to destroy instantly the ship, and occasionally opened in wide cracks through which rushed the open sea. Indeed, the conditions were so critical and the ice-movements so rapid, that the entire party, within the brief space of twenty-four hours, had four times made ready to abandon their vessels.

In March the cold became intense, and for a week it averaged fifty-three degrees below the freezing-point. Scurvy assailed all but five of the crew, and De Haven was so ill that all his duties devolved on Griffin, who heroically bore up under disease and the mental and moral responsibilities that the situation forced on him. In all his efforts Griffin had no more effective coadjutor than the fleet-surgeon, Kane. Whether acting as a medical officer, treating skilfully the diseased crew; as a hunter, supplementing their scanty stock of anti-scorbutic food with the fresh meat of the seal; or as a man, devising means of amusement and stimulating them to mental and physical exertions, Kane incessantly displayed such qualities of cheerfulness, activity, and ingenuity as tended to dispel the pall of despair that sometimes enveloped the whole expedition.

When release from the ice permitted the voyage to be renewed, De Haven decided to refit in the Greenland ports and again return to Lancaster Sound; fortunately, as the squadron was not fitted for a second year's work, the ice in Melville Bay was such as to prevent immediate passage, and so they turned southward, reaching the United States on September 30, 1851.

Such desperate experiences as those involved in the midwinter drift of the Advance, would have deterred most men for a time from a second voyage, but with Kane the stimulus to future work apparently increased with every league that he sailed southward. The ship was hardly in port before he initiated a plan for another expedition in the spring of 1852. This failing he wrote Lady Franklin in May, offering to go with Captain Penny, or any good sailing-master, to give his services without pay, and pledging himself to go to work and raise funds.

Finding it impossible to go with any British expedition, he turned his entire efforts to organizing another from America. His chivalric enthusiasm enlisted the sympathies and active support of Henry Grinnell and George Peabody, the first loaning the ship and the latter contributing $10,000 for general expenses. The United States again aided, not only putting Kane on sea-pay, but also attached ten men of the Navy, under government pay. Instruments, provisions, etc., were likewise supplied by the Secretary of the Navy, and aid in other directions was afforded by the Smithsonian Institution, the Naval Observatory, and other scientific associations. At this juncture the discoveries of Captain Inglefield, R. N., in Smith Sound, afforded to Kane a new route for his activities. The scheme, as far as the search for Franklin was concerned, was well-meaning, but none the less fallacious and illogical. Kane was personally cognizant of the fact that Franklin had gone into Lancaster Sound, and had wintered in 1845-46 at Beechy Island, plainly following the direct and positive orders of the Admiralty, that he should push southward from Cape Walker to the neighborhood of Behring Strait. Moreover, the last mail ever received from the Franklin expedition contained a letter from Captain Fitz-James, in which he stated that Franklin had shown him the orders, expressed his disbelief in an open sea to the north, and had given "a pleasant account of his expectations of being able to get through the ice on the north coast of America."

A search for Franklin by the way of Smith Sound, seventeen degrees of longitude and four degrees of latitude to the north and east of his last known position, was to assume not only that Franklin had disobeyed the strict letter of his instructions, but had also abandoned his voyage after having accomplished one-third of the distance from Greenland to Behring Strait.

As the initiator and inspirer of the expedition, Kane was the natural head of it, but there were difficulties in the way.

The assignment of a surgeon to the command of a naval expedition was unprecedented; but somehow Kane succeeded in overcoming even the time-honored observances of the Navy, and was placed in command by a formal order of the Secretary of the Navy in November, 1852.

Kane repeatedly set forth his belief in an open Polar sea, and announced his expectation of reaching it. The expedition was not alone a proposed search for Franklin, but especially contemplated the continuation to the northward of the discoveries made in 1851 by Captain Inglefield, on the west coast of Greenland. Kane declared his intention of reaching "its most northern attainable point, and thence pressing on toward the Pole as far as boats or sleds could carry us, examine the coast lines for vestiges of the lost party," and "seeking the _open sea_ ... launch our little boats, and embark upon its waters."

On May 30, 1853, the expedition left New York in the sailing brig Advance, there being seventeen members all told. The vessel was stanch, well-fitted, and suitable, the scientific instruments satisfactory, but the provisions were illy chosen for Arctic service, and the equipment in many respects inadequate or deficient. The Greenland ports supplied skin-clothing, dogs, and Eskimo dog-drivers; the latter being destined to play an important part in establishing harmonious relations with the Etah natives. On reaching Melville Bay, Kane decided to take the middle passage, direct through the dreaded pack--a most venturesome route for a sailing-vessel. Favored by an off-shore gale, the Advance escaped with the loss of a whaleboat, and emerged into the open sea near Cape York, known as the North Water. Stopped by the ice, Kane wisely decided to cache his metallic life-boat, filled with boat-stores, on Littleton Island, so as to secure his retreat, since, as he says: "My mind was made up from the first that we are to force our way to the north as far as the elements will let us." The ice opening with the tide, Kane rounded Cape Hatherton and was now in Kane Sea; but the Advance was immediately driven into a cove for shelter. At the first opportunity sail was again made and a short distance gained to the east-northeast, when a violent gale nearly wrecked her. Repeated efforts to work the vessel to the eastward, along a lee coast, destroyed fittings and boat, and were so fruitful in danger that on August 26th seven out of his eight officers addressed Kane in writing, to the effect "that a further progress to the North was impossible, and [they] were in favor of returning southward to winter." Unfortunately, Kane was not "able conscientiously to take the same view," as such retreat would have left him in a less favorable situation to pursue his explorations. Two weeks longer the brig was warped to the east during high water, whenever she was not jammed by huge floes against the rugged coast; but at low water the brig grounded and was daily in danger of total destruction. Finally, on September 9th, she was put in winter-quarters in 78° 37' N., 71° 14' W., in Rensselaer Harbor, which, says Kane, "we were fated never to leave together--a long resting-place to her, for the same ice is round her still." Winter now advanced with startling rapidity and excessive severity; freezing temperatures now permanently obtained, the water-fowl were gone, and the scanty vegetation blighted. All were busy, some constructing a building for magnetic and meteorological observations, others making journeys along the eastern coast. Kane visited the high land adjoining Mary Minturn River, some fifty miles away, whence he could see Washington Land in the vicinity of Cape Constitution. Hayes and Wilson journeyed on the inland ice, while McGary with six others made three caches on the coast, the farthest being under the face of the largest of all Arctic glaciers, now known by the name of Humboldt. The winter proved to be unusually cold, the temperature, from December to March inclusive, averaging fifty-four degrees below the freezing-point of water. Most fortunately the men remained in health, but Kane grieved over the loss of his dogs, only a dozen surviving out of the original eighty.

In this contingency Kane decided to put his men in the field, and after two weeks of excessive cold, the temperature averaging seventy-seven degrees below freezing, a party was sent out while the mercury was yet frozen. Their orders were to reach Washington Land, about one hundred miles distant across the sea-ice. It soon became evident to Brooks, the commander of the party, that the journey was impossible of execution, and after eight marches, in which less than forty miles were traversed, he turned back on March 29, 1854. The cold that day was intense, about ninety degrees below freezing, and the next morning four men were frozen so badly that they could not walk. Only four men were left for work. The distance to the brig was thirty miles, while the intervening ice was so rough that they could not drag their disabled comrades. Hickey volunteered to remain, while Sontag, Ohlsen, and Petersen should go to the brig for help. The three men finally reached the Advance, but they were so physically exhausted and in such mental condition that they could not even indicate in what direction they had left their comrades.

Kane appreciated the gravity of the situation and the necessity of prompt measures. A relief party was at once started, which Kane led himself, despite his impaired health, physical weakness, and general unfitness for such a desperate journey; as always, he spared not himself when danger threatened. Ohlsen, being the clearest-headed of the sledgemen, was put in a sleeping-bag and dragged on a sledge as a guide.

Eighteen hours' travel were without tangible result; Kane fainted twice on the snow; his stoutest men were seized with trembling fits, and as yet no signs of the missing party. Fortunately Kane had taken the Eskimo, Hans Hendrik, whose keen eye discovered the track that led to the tent of the frozen men. They were alive, but crippled beyond the possibility of marching. The weather remained fine or all would have perished, and as it was, Hayes, the surgeon, in his report of their condition on reaching the brig, said: "I was startled by their ghastly appearance. When I hailed them they met me only with a vacant, wild stare. They were to a man delirious." Of the eight men only one returned sound; two shortly died, two others suffered amputations, and three escaped with temporary disabilities.

Three weeks later, on April 26th, Kane set out on what, to use his own words, "was to be the crowning expedition of the campaign, to attain the Ultima Thule of the Greenland shore." Impressed with the impracticability of a direct journey across the main ice-pack, he decided to follow the shore-line, five men dragging a sledge, while Kane and Godfrey travelled by dog-team. He had been led by his resolute spirit to overestimate the physical strength of his men and himself, and the party broke down before it had even approached the Humboldt Glacier. Their enthusiastic leader was stricken with fainting spells and rigidity of limbs, but Kane would not admit his illness to be more than temporary, and bidding the men strap him on the sledge, proceeded onward. His diminished physical powers now became evident through the freezing of his rigid and swollen limbs. Delirious and fainting at the end of the march, he was carried in an almost insensible condition to his tent, when his men wisely took the matter in their own hands and started back for the brig. Nine days later, through forced marches and heroic efforts of his sledge-mates, themselves partially disabled, Kane was carried on board the Advance fluctuating between life and death. Hardly conscious, his mind clouded, and his swollen features barely recognizable, his general condition was such that the surgeon regarded his ultimate recovery as nearly hopeless.

While Kane's recuperative powers were simply marvellous, yet he did not recover sufficiently to make another journey that spring. In this extremity he turned to his surgeon, Israel I. Hayes, who volunteered to explore the unknown shores of Grinnell Land, which lay in sight to the west of Smith Sound. With the seaman Godfrey as a companion and a dog-team as the means of transportation, Hayes struggled through the almost impassable floes and bergs of the main strait and finally attained Cape Hayes, on the western coast, in about 79° 45' N. latitude. The return journey to the Advance was possible only by abandoning everything that in the slightest degree impeded the progress of the exhausted men and famishing dogs.

This success caused Kane to make one more effort to reach the hitherto inaccessible Washington Land, and for this purpose he placed all his means at the disposal of one of his seamen, William Morton. A supporting party accompanied Morton to Humboldt Glacier, whence he proceeded with Eskimo Hans Hendrik and a dog-team on the advance journey. Their track lay over the sea-ice, about five miles from, and parallel with, the face of the glacier. Five days took them to the new land to the north, and three days later, June 24, 1854, Morton reached alone an impassable headland, Cape Constitution. From the highest attainable elevation Morton found his view completely cut off to the northeast, but between the west and north he could see the southeastern half of Kennedy's Channel as far north as Mount Ross, 80° 58' N. He says "Not a speck of ice was to be seen as far as I could observe; the sea was open, the swell came from the northward ... and the surf broke in on the rocks below in regular breakers." Morton described accurately the general landscape, but he was an incompetent astronomical observer, and his estimates of distances were excessive. The farthest point was charted nearly a hundred miles north of its true position, while Cape Constitution was placed 31 miles too far north by Morton and 52 geographic miles by Kane, who "corrected" Morton's observations by a series of erroneous bearings. Morton's general account of his explorations has been confirmed by Hans Hendrik in his Memoir written some years since in Eskimo.

In the meantime the Etah Eskimo, natives of Prudhoe land, had discovered the brig, and through the interpreter, Hans Hendrik, promptly established friendly relations with Kane. It may be said that the expedition owed its final safety to these natives; their supplies of fresh meat checked scurvy, and later their dog teams rendered retreat possible. Slight misunderstandings, not always the fault of the natives, naturally occurred, but the Eskimo were honest, humane, and willing, and never committed a hostile act.

The summer of 1854 justified the expressed fears of Kane's officers, for it passed with the ice yet unbroken in Rensselaer Harbor. It was evident in July that the brig would never be freed from the ice, and in this critical situation, Kane, taking five men in a whaleboat, attempted to reach Beechy Island, several hundred miles to the southwest, whence he expected to obtain succor from the English searching squadron. The unfavorable condition of the ice in Smith Sound caused the failure of this attempt, and, yet worse, encouraged the idea of dividing the party; an idea that culminated in the well-known "Arctic Boat Journey," as Dr. Hayes termed it. Despite Kane's futile experiences in July, the majority of the party maintained that a boat journey to Upernavik was both practicable and advisable. Confronted by this attitude of the expeditionary force, Kane assembled them, set forth the dangers of such an attempt, and vehemently urged them to abandon the project, which the lateness of the season and the unfavorable ice conditions rendered most improbable of success. Finally he granted the privilege of unfettered action to such as believed the journey practicable, stipulating only that those leaving the vessel should renounce, in writing, all claims upon the expedition and should elect a leader. Nine elected to go, eight to remain. Kane displayed a magnanimous spirit, equipping them most liberally, and assuring them, in writing, that the brig should be ever open should disaster overtake them. The boat journey was a failure, and Kane bade them welcome when, early in December, he learned that the party, some two hundred miles distant and in imminent danger of perishing by starvation, was desirous of returning to the Advance. Kane promptly sent supplies to the suffering men, and, on December 12th, the entire crew was once again upon the brig.

The winter of 1854-5 passed wretchedly; the physical condition of the party steadily deteriorated; failing fuel necessitated the burning of the upper woodwork of the brig; their food was reduced to ordinary marine stores, and game failed equally to the hunters of the Advance and the persistent efforts of the Etah natives on the ice-clad land and in the frozen sea. In addition scurvy attacked the crew; Hayes lost a portion of his frozen foot, and hardly a man of the crew remained fit for duty. The necessity of abandoning the brig and retreating by boat to Upernavik, Danish Greenland, was now forced upon Kane's mind. The co-operation of the natives greatly facilitated, if it did not alone render possible, the transportation of their provisions, boats, and stores to Cape Alexander. Kane says the Eskimo "brought daily supplies of birds, assisted in carrying boat stores, and invariably exhibited the kindest feelings and strictest honesty."

Bidding farewell to the natives at Cape Alexander on June 15, 1855, Cape York was passed, the land ice of Melville Bay followed, and the northern coast of Danish Greenland reached in forty-seven days. In the meantime a relief squadron under command of Lieutenant Hartstene, United States Navy, had visited Smith Sound, where the natives informed him of Kane's journey southward. Taken on board the returning flag-ship at Disco, Kane and his men reached New York, October 11, 1855.

Kane had hardly reached home when it became evident that his undermined constitution could not longer withstand the inroads of a disease which for twenty years had afflicted him. Change of climate was tried without avail, and he died at Havana, Cuba, February 16, 1857, at the early age of thirty-seven.

Between his first and second voyages Kane had become deeply interested in Margaretta Fox, one of the well-known spiritualists, who later published their correspondence under the title of "The Love Life of Dr. Kane." Their relations, it is believed, resulted in a secret marriage shortly before Kane's death.

The rare literary skill shown in the account of Kane's expedition has charmed millions of readers with its graphic account of the labors, hardships, and privations of Kane and his men. It should not, however, be considered that this expedition merits attention alone from its tales of suffering and bravery, for none other of that generation contributed so materially to a correct knowledge of the Arctic regions. In ethnology it gave the first full account of the Etah Eskimo, the northernmost inhabitants of the world; in natural history its data as to the flora and fauna of the isolated and ice-surrounded extremity of western Greenland were original, and have been to this day but scantily supplemented; in physical sciences, the magnetic, tidal, and climatic observations remained for twenty years the most important series pertaining to the Arctic regions. Kane's voyage not only extended geographically Inglefield's discoveries a hundred miles to the northward, but it also opened up a practical and safe route for Arctic exploration, which has been more fruitful of successful results than any other.

Kane was a man of generous impulses, enthusiastic ideals, and kindly heart. His chivalric nature, indomitable will, and great courage often impelled him to hazardous enterprises; but he stands out in this modern age as an unselfish character, willing to brave hardships and risk his own life on a vague possibility of rescuing Franklin and his companions.

[Signature: A. W. Greely.]

FERDINAND DE LESSEPS[16]

[Footnote 16: Copyright, 1894, by Selmar Hess.]

By CLARENCE COOK

(1805-1894)

If, as Dante sings: "There is no greater grief than in a time of misery to remember happier days," there are few persons in our time who can testify more feelingly to the truth of the poet's words than Ferdinand de Lesseps. For many years he was a bright-shining, sympathetic figure among those who lead in the van of our material progress; and the accomplishment, by his initiative and energy, of the long dream of the Suez Canal, made him the hero, not of his own nation alone, but of all the civilized world; honors were heaped upon him, and acclamations greeted him on every side. His name became a household word.

A few years later, and all is changed. At the advanced age of eighty-eight, Ferdinand de Lesseps is in deep disgrace. Charged with the chief responsibility for the ruin brought about by the failure of another of his great enterprises--the Panama Canal--he has been condemned by the tribunal to pay a huge fine, and has only been saved from the shame of actual imprisonment by the knowledge of his judges that, in his feeble state of health, imprisonment would speedily be fatal. As at the ceremonies on the occasion of the opening of the Suez Canal, De Lesseps was compared to Columbus, the opener of a way to the new world, so we may see the close of the great discoverer's career reflected in the tragic ending of the splendid fortunes of De Lesseps.

Ferdinand de Lesseps was the son of a French gentleman who, fifty years since, was in the Consular service of France in Egypt. He was born at Versailles in 1805, and after receiving the usual education given to youth of his class, he was early inducted into the mysteries of diplomatic life, where his father's services and influence naturally opened a way for him. In 1833, when twenty-eight, he was made consul at Cairo, and remained at that post for over ten years, during which time he laid the foundations for that knowledge of all matters connected with Egyptian affairs which was to prove so valuable to him and to the world a few years later.

In 1842, De Lesseps was transferred from Cairo to Spain, and was made consul at Barcelona. Spain was at this time much disturbed by factional quarrels and jealousies, partly due to disputed claims to the succession to the throne, and partly to the angry rivalries of political leaders, each eager to save the country by his particular nostrum. In the dynastic struggle, Queen Christina, made regent after the death of her husband, Ferdinand VII., had been exiled to France, and General Espartero, who at first had stood for her cause, now ruled as regent in her place. In 1843, the year after the arrival of De Lesseps, the city of Barcelona, which in common with many other places had refused to support Espartero, openly revolted, and was besieged and bombarded by his forces; and in the course of the siege, which brought great misery upon the inhabitants, De Lesseps did so many humane and generous acts at great personal risk, that he was rewarded by honors from the governments of several nations whose subjects had been protected by him in his official capacity.

It was natural that after this proof of his abilities, De Lesseps should be advanced to a still higher position, and in the spring of 1848 he was made minister to Madrid. This place he held, however, only until February, 1849, for in May of that year he was sent to Rome to patch up a peace between the popular party and the French army of occupation. This proved an unfortunate venture. De Lesseps was recalled to France in disgrace, in June of the same year, for having shown too great a sympathy for the party of Mazzini, which aimed to establish a Roman Republic.

It may be conjectured that the disappointment of De Lesseps at this abrupt ending of his diplomatic career was not very great. He had not been drawn to the profession by natural inclination, but had inherited it, so to speak, from his father, as another man might inherit the profession of law or medicine, or as the son of a mechanic might inherit his father's trade. His ambition and tastes both led him in a different direction; he would play a more active, a more striking part in the affairs of his time.

During the period of his residence in Egypt, as consul for France, he must often have heard the project of a canal across the Isthmus of Suez discussed, since the course of events was every year making the necessity of the undertaking more evident. As is well known, the idea of such a canal was not a new one: Herodotus speaks of a canal designed and partly excavated by Pharaoh Necho in the seventh century before Christ, to connect the city of Bubastis, in the Delta of the Nile, with the Red Sea. As planned, the canal was to be ten feet deep with a width sufficient for two triremes to pass abreast, and it was expected that the voyage would be accomplished in four days. After the lives of 126,000 Egyptian workmen had been sacrificed to the hardships of the undertaking, Herodotus says that Necho, alarmed at the difficulties and expense, consulted the Oracle as to what was best for him to do, and received the answer: "Thou art working for barbarians." The Egyptians, like the Greeks, considered all foreigners as barbarians, and the answer simply reflected the sentiment of the people, or of their leaders, that this vast expenditure of labor, time, and money would prove to be, after all, as much for the benefit of foreigners as for themselves. The Oracle gave a voice to national and political prejudices, such as even in our own time are continually evoked to block the wheels of great enterprises. Necho, we are told, heeded the warning of the Oracle and abandoned the enterprise, but about one hundred years later, in the time of Darius Hystaspes, work on the canal was resumed and the undertaking was completed. From time to time we find mention made of the canal by later authors, but about the end of the eighth century of our era it was finally abandoned and left to be blocked up by the sand.

The project was revived by Napoleon I. at the time of his Egyptian expedition; but, on the report of his engineer, M. Lepère, now known to be mistaken, that the Red Sea level was thirty feet higher than that of the Mediterranean, nothing further was done; nor was it until so late as 1847 that it was again taken up and an attempt made to interest the maritime powers of Europe in the scheme; but nothing serious was accomplished.

In truth, the idea of a canal uniting the two seas, had up to this time been largely sentimental, if we may so express it; rather connected with vast schemes of conquest than founded on the vital needs of commercial development and the material good of the people. The commerce of the Mediterranean countries with India and the remoter East had not in those earlier times reached a point where such a costly undertaking as the Suez Canal could prove remunerative; what trade there was could be sufficiently and more cheaply accommodated by the Overland machinery of caravans, while France, Spain, and England still found the route by the Cape to answer all their purposes. In fact it was more than doubtful whether sailing-vessels, by means of which trade was then chiefly carried on, or even steamers of the build then employed, could use the canal to profit. It was believed that the advantages promised by a shorter route would be counterbalanced by the delays and dangers reckoned inseparable from the navigation of so narrow a water-way.

These objections, really of a serious nature, made it difficult to win over the business world to a practical interest in the scheme. De Lesseps had been from the start the chief mover in the enterprise, to which he had given many years of his time, and he was not a man to be discouraged by repeated failures to bring others to his own way of thinking. His long experience, besides, in the ways of diplomacy had prepared him for delays and obstructions; but the time came, at last, when his enthusiasm, his confidence in himself, and his skill in dealing with men were to bring about the realization of his hopes.

Five years, from 1849 to 1854, had been occupied by De Lesseps in negotiations with governments and bankers, but it was not until 1854 that the event occurred which insured the success of his great undertaking. In that year, Mahomet Saïd Pasha became Viceroy of Egypt, and no sooner was he seated than he sent for De Lesseps to consult with him as to the possibility of carrying out the project of the canal. In November of the same year, a commission was signed at Cairo by the Viceroy charging De Lesseps with the formation of a company to be named the United Suez Canal Company, with a capital of two hundred million francs, afterward raised to three hundred million. From this time the affairs of the canal went on with comparative smoothness, and by 1858 the money necessary for the work had been pledged; one-half the loan was placed on the continent, chiefly in Paris, the other half was taken by the Viceroy.

Actual work on the canal was begun in 1858 and such rapid progress was made that it was completed in the autumn of 1869, and opened to the commerce of the world with magnificent ceremonies, lasting for several days. Religious ceremonies, in which priests of the Catholic Church, the Greek Church, and the Moslem faith united, were followed by a naval parade representing the European powers and the United States, and the whole concluded with a brilliant series of fêtes and entertainments at Cairo. As the originator of the canal, De Lesseps, was a Frenchman, and as France had been the chief promoter of the enterprise, the place of honor at these ceremonies was naturally given to the Empress Eugénie, who went to Cairo as the representative of the French nation; while to De Lesseps, as naturally, was given the next place, a position which he filled with equal dignity and modesty, winning "golden opinions from all sorts of people."

The Suez Canal, though a vast and important undertaking, presented almost no engineering difficulties to be overcome. At Port Saïd, the Mediterranean entrance to the canal, two great piers, to serve as breakwaters, were built of artificial stone, projecting into the sea; the western, a distance of 6,940 feet, the eastern 6,020 feet, and enclosing an area of 450 acres; thus providing a safe and commodious harbor. At Suez, the Red Sea terminus of the canal, a less formidable defense was needed; but the necessary docks and buildings called for a considerable outlay.

From Port Saïd to Suez the land is almost a dead level; the few sand-dunes that break the monotonous uniformity of the isthmus nowhere reach a greater height than fifty or sixty feet. Along the middle line of the isthmus there was a series of depressions; some shallow, and others, the bottoms of which were lower than the level of the sea. Although these depressions were at all times dry, yet they were called "lakes," and as such figure on the maps, where we read the names "Lake Timsah," "The Bitter Lakes" and others. They were found to be thickly incrusted with salt on the bottom and sides, indicating that at one time they had been filled with sea-water; it is indeed must probable that the whole isthmus was at a very remote period entirely submerged. In the construction of the canal these depressions were made to play a very important part. The line of the canal was carried directly through them; the shallower were brought to a sufficient depth by dredging; the deeper were simply filled with water and required nothing more for safe navigation than an indication of the channel by buoys. Thus, in the whole length of the canal, reckoned at 88 geographical miles, there are 66 miles of actual digging; 14 miles of dredging through the lakes; and 8 miles, where neither digging nor dredging was required.

Water began to flow from the Mediterranean into the canal in February, 1869, and from the Red Sea in July of the same year; and by October, the lakes, and the canal in its whole length, were filled with water navigable by vessels of the highest class. The water-way thus obtained has a width at the surface varying from 197 feet at deep cuttings, to 225 feet at lower ground. The sides slope to a width at the bottom of 72 feet, and an average depth of 26 feet is secured along the whole course. As the water is at one level from sea to sea, the canal is without obstruction of any kind. No locks, dams, or water-gates are required, and vessels enter the canal from either end and pursue their journey without interruption or detention.

So great, however, was the eagerness of trade to take advantage of the new route, that the volume of traffic increased within a very short time after the opening of the canal to such an extent as to cause serious delays in the transit, and a number of schemes were brought forward for building other canals by which the two seas might be united. In the end, all these plans were abandoned, and it was decided to widen the canal sufficiently to enable it to meet the increased demand upon its carrying capacity. It may not be without interest to note the growth of traffic in the canal by a few figures. From 486 ships which passed through in 1870, the number rose to 3,100 in 1886; while the receipts increased from $1,031,875 in 1870, to $11,541,090 in 1886. The canal, when completed, was found to have cost twenty million pounds sterling, a sum far in advance of the original estimate, but made necessary by the addition of several important items of expenditure that were not foreseen. One of these was the substitution of paid labor for the forced labor promised by the Pasha, but which was made impossible by public clamor. The Egyptian ruler discovered that he was not living in the times of the pyramid-building Pharaohs, when men were made beasts-of-burden. Another item not provided for was the necessity of supplying the 30,000 workmen employed on the canal with fresh water. For this purpose, a branch canal had to be dug, by which water could be brought from the Nile.

The enterprise thus brought to a happy ending, has already proved of great service to the world. It must be looked upon not merely as a benefit to commerce, but as one of the many powerful agents now at work binding the nations closer together. It is indissolubly connected with the name of De Lesseps, and had he been contented with the fortune and the reputation gained by his work in forwarding the canal, few names would have shone brighter in the list of those who have helped on man's material well-being. But in an evil hour he was persuaded to lend his support to the Panama Canal scheme, and along with the ruined fortunes and ruined reputations sunk in that abyss, the name and fortune of De Lesseps and his family have suffered irretrievable blight.

The Panama Canal was not first proposed in our day; the scheme is as old as the discovery of the isthmus. "The early navigators," says J. C. Rodrigues, "could not help noticing how near to each other were the two oceans, and how comparatively easy would be (they thought) the cutting of a canal through that narrow strip of land between them. The celebrated Portuguese navigator Antonio Galväo, as early as 1550, wrote an essay on the subject wherein he suggested four different lines, one of which was through the Lake of Nicaragua, and another by the Isthmus of Panama." England, in 1779, was the first to make an attempt to control the river and lake communications, but her forces sent under Nelson to begin the work were driven away by the terrible fever that has thus far been the best defence of the isthmus from attack. Various schemes were entertained by other nations, but, although the United States kept a jealous eye upon its own interests in the enterprise, it was not until the discovery of gold in California that it saw a vital reason for insisting upon its paramount claims, and the outbreak of the Civil War, with its threats of European intervention, made an easier communication with the rising States of the Pacific Coast seem an absolute necessity. But we moved slowly and with vacillating steps. We were divided in opinion as to the best route to take, as to the sort of canal that was desirable, as to the advisability of building any canal. When the war was over, the rapid increase of railroad communication with the Pacific Coast made public opinion still more indifferent to the enterprise. Meanwhile the French had started with great energy a scheme for a canal at Panama, and De Lesseps had been induced to lend his name to the scheme, and to take an active part in carrying it out. For this purpose he visited the United States and used his best diplomatic arts to induce our Government to unite with him in his plans. But he could do nothing on this side the water and returned to France to fight the battle alone. There the interest in the scheme, artificially excited by speculators and still further aided by the efforts of De Lesseps and his friends, increased to such an extent as to swamp all considerations of prudence. The name of De Lesseps, consecrated by the brilliant success of Suez, proved to be a powerful charm. Thousands and tens of thousands of people in the cities and in the country put the hard-earned savings of years into the venture; senators, deputies, men of high social rank in public life, shamelessly sold their votes and their voices to secure the moral aid and the money of the state to aid their gambling enterprise, and the newspaper press of Paris, at all times venal, betrayed for bribes the trust that was reposed in it.

Such a state of things could not last forever. The end, long prophesied, came at last; the exposure was complete, and the whole stupendous scheme of fraud was unmasked. Something might have been saved from the wreck had the canal itself been a real thing so far as it had gone, a practical enterprise, sure in time to pay its investors and serve the public. But it was found that everything connected with the construction of the canal had been grossly misrepresented; the estimates of expense; the reports of the engineering difficulties to be overcome; the dangers from the climate; the bills of mortality; everything, in short, was enveloped in a cloud of lies. So great was the shock to public confidence that followed this exposure, that for a time the Republic itself seemed in danger of overthrow. The eyes of the world were fixed upon De Lesseps and his son Charles as the chief authors of the mischief, and when the crisis was passed, and the smoke of the upheaval had passed away, the Panama Canal was seen to be a ruined enterprise, and buried deep underneath it was the once-honored name of Ferdinand De Lesseps.

[Signature: Clarence Cook.]

GENERAL JOHN C. FRÉMONT[17]

[Footnote 17: Copyright, 1894, by Selmar Hess.]

By JANE MARSH PARKER

(1813-1890)

In these days of rapid transit between New York and San Francisco, of luxurious travel across desert and mountain, the story of John Charles Frémont, the Pathfinder of the great West, is of peculiar interest, a striking illustration that the history of the world is in the biography of its leaders, in the pathfinders of the unexplored.

The stormy tide of the French Revolution sent the father of John Charles Frémont to the New World about the time, presumably, when Napoleon Bonaparte was in the height of power. This M. Frémont came of a good family living near Lyons, France. A British man-of-war made prize of the ship in which he sailed for San Domingo, and he was carried prisoner to one of the British West India islands, his captivity lasting several years. Upon gaining his liberty he stopped at Norfolk, Va., to refill an empty purse as a teacher of French, and there met Anne Beverly Whiting, a leading belle of an old Virginia family, who became his wife. One of the illustrious connections of the Whitings was that with the family of George Washington. M. Frémont's marked fondness for travel and adventure was shared by his wife. They took long journeys through the wild southern country, stopping at Indian villages, often sleeping by camp-fires. On one of these expeditions, when making a halt at Savannah, Ga., John Charles, their first child, was born, January 21, 1813. M. Frémont died a few years after.

The boyhood of John Charles was spent in Charleston. It is well to remember, in a study of his life, his French blood and early southern environment. His first choice of a profession was the law. At the age of fourteen he became a student in the office of John W. Mitchell, who placed him under a private tutor, Dr. Roberton, who understood the lad thoroughly and developed his character in the right direction. Dr. Roberton seems to have first discovered what was made plain in Frémont's after-life--the makings of a poet, and the foresight of a prophet. Translating the story of the battle of Marathon in the Greek class, young Frémont catches the spirit with which it was told by Herodotus, and writes verses in protest of tyranny which are published in one of the Charleston papers. "In one year," wrote his tutor, "he had read four books of Cæsar; Cornelius Nepos; Sallust; six books of Virgil; nearly all of Horace, and two books of Livy. In Greek--all of Græca Minora, about half of the first volume of Græca Majora, and four books of the Iliad." At fifteen he enters the junior class of Charleston College. At sixteen he is confirmed in the Episcopal Church, entertaining at that time thoughts of entering the ministry. His steady progress is interrupted by his first love affair; his absorbing passion so gets the better of his common sense, that he neglects his books and classes and is expelled from college. We next find him teaching higher mathematics, acting as private tutor, and devoting his evenings to the charge of the _Apprentice's Library_, a school in Charleston. At twenty years of age he received the appointment of teacher of mathematics, and his long connection with the United States Army had its beginning; his post the sloop of war Natchez. He was to go on a cruise of two years and more along the coast of South America. Here was a chance for him to unfit himself for further advancement, but he improved his time upon the cruise to the utmost, and his diligent scholarship won for him the double degree of bachelor and master of arts from the college from which he had been expelled. His application for a mathematical professorship in the Navy resulted in his passing the severe examination, and in an appointment to the frigate Independence. He declined the office, however, having decided to become an engineer, to join Captain Williams's survey of the mountain passes between South Carolina and Tennessee. There was talk of a railroad between Charleston and Cincinnati in those days.

That was Frémont's first experience in exploring expeditions. The corps lived chiefly in camp. The survey was in wild mountainous regions of the unexplored South, among Indians sullen against the Government. Frémont liked this kind of a life. He enlisted under Captain Williams the second time in 1837, as assistant engineer, going with him upon a military reconnoissance of the Cherokee country in Georgia, North Carolina, and Tennessee. A war cloud was rising; the peril of the expedition was its charm to Frémont. "St. Louis was then on the border of an immense and almost unexplored Indian country. The caravans of merchandise going through it to Santa Fé, ran all the risks you can read of among Bedouins in the desert; the hunters and trappers, as well as the merchants, started off into the unknown with only one certainty, that danger was there; and when they came back--if they ever did--it was as from underworld."[18]

[Footnote 18: Souvenirs of my Time. Jessie Benton Frémont.]