My Attainment of the Pole

ne of those comparatively few mental pictures which are photographed with a terribly vivid distinctness of detail, because of their emotional effect, during everyone's existen

asionally by purplish, silver-shot mists, was tinged with a faint, burning lilac. Through opening cracks in the constantly moving field of ice, cold strata of air rose, defle

s whose heads rose above the horizon as the heads of a giant army appearing over the summits of a far-away mountain. They moved forward, retreated, diminished in size, and titanically reappeared again

ch in olden times, it is said, were conjured at Endor. It seemed fitting that they should march and remarch about me; that the low beating of the wind should suddenly swell into throbbing martial music. For that moment I was intoxicated. I st

feel when he has mastered a formidable alien army. Standing on this spot, I felt that I, a human being, with all of humanity's frailties, had conquered cold, evaded famine, endured an inhuman battling with a rigorous, infuriated Nature in a soul-racking, body-sapping journey such as no man perhaps had ever made. I had proved myself to myself, with no thoug

he thrill, despite all that has passed since then, remain, and will remain with me as

North Pole approximately, and ascertained my location as accurately, as painstakingly, as the terrestrial and celestial conditions and the best instruments would allow; that I thrilled with victory, and made my claim on as honest, as careful, as scientific a basis of observations and calculations as any human being could, I do emphatically assert. That any man, in reaching this region, coul

been made to suffer so bitterly and so inexpressibly as I because of the assertion of my achievement. So persistent, so egregious, so overwhelming were the attacks made upon me that for a time my spirit was broken, and in the bitterness of my soul I even felt desirous of disappearing to some rem

sensation. In going away for a rest it did not seem prudent to take the press into my confidence, a course which resulted in the mean slurs that I had abandoned my cause. This again was used by my enemies to blacken my character. In reality, I had tried to keep the ungracious Polar controversy within the bounds of decent, gentlemanly conduct; but inde

es made against me, and about those by whom the charges were made. Herein, FOR THE FIRST TIME, I will tell how and why I believed I reached the North Pole, a

. Herein, for the first time, shall I answer in toto all charges made against me, and this because the entire truth concerning these same charges I have not succeeded in giving the world through other channels. Because of the power of those who arrayed them

confirm the worst charges of my detractors. That I have been too charitable with those who attempted to steal the justly deserved honors of my achievement, I am now convinced; when desirable, I shall now, having felt the smarting sting of the world's whip, and in order to justify myself, use the knife. I shall tell the truth even though it hurts. I have not been spared, and I shall spare no one in telling

and single-hearted, single-sustained confidence of a man whose vision his own people doubted. Even in my own time have explorers been assailed, among them Stanley, whose name for a time was shrouded with suspicion, and others who since have joined the ranks of my assailants. Unfortunately, in such cases the matter of proof and th

a world-madness, which startled and bewildered me. In that swift, sudden, lightning-flash ascension to glory, which I had not expected, and in which I was as a bit of helpless drift in the thundering tossing of an ocean storm, I was decorated with unasked-fo

e to him who throbs with the gratification of a personal success, I was greeted with mad cheers and hooting whistles, with bursting guns and blaring bands. I was led through streets filled with applauding

ch a claim myself, I was a liar. I did not then doubt the good faith of Peary's claim; having reached the boreal center myself, under extremely favorable weather conditions, I felt that he, with everything in his favor, could do as much a year later, as he claimed

imited money at its command, which has had as its allies dishonest pseudo-scientists, financially and otherwise interested in the success of Mr. Peary's expedition. With a chain of powerful newspapers, a financial backer of Peary led a campaign to destroy confidence in me. I found myself in due time, before I realized the importance of underhand attacks, in a quandary which baffled and bewildered me. Without any or

ue way were to consist of unreduced reckonings. Mr. Peary had his own-he had buried part of mine. I did not at the time instantly produce these vague and obscure proofs, knowing, as all scientists know, that figures must inevitably be inadequate and that any convincing proof that can exist is to b

raphic Society's verdict was based upon an indifferent examination of worthless observations and a few seconds' casual observation of Mr. Peary's instruments by several members of the Society in the Pennsylvania Railroad Station at Washington. With many lecture engagements, I considered that I was right

Peary's had exceeded mine. The use by the newspaper running my narrative story of photographs of Arctic scenes-which never change in character-that had been taken by me on previous trips, was held up as visible evidence that I was a faker! Errors which crept into my ne

as vague because of the non-actinic light in the North, the newspaper photographers retouched the print and painted on it a shadow as being cast from the flag and snow i

ouraged the delusion of my Eskimos that the mirages and low-lying clouds which appeared almost daily were signs of land. In their ignorance and their eagerness to be near land, they believed this, and by this innocent deception I prevented the panic which seizes every Arctic savage when he finds himself upon the circumpolar sea out of s

knowing also that the alleged route on his map which he said they drew was valueless, inasmuch as an Eskimo out of sight of land and in an unfamiliar region has no sense of location. I felt the whole statement to be what it w

NCKE IN ARC

which was taken up with great hue and cry, I bitterly felt this to be a deliberate untruth on Mr. Peary's part. I have since learned that one of Mr. Peary's officers cross-questioned my Eskimos, and that by showing them Mr. Peary's own instruments he discovered just what instruments I had had with me on my trip, and that by describing the method of using these instruments to

RAMA OF BLACK LA

of Mr. Peary himself, they were as good as any offered by anyone. I was perhaps unfortunate in not having, as Mr. P

of which Peary was president. One of Colonel Mann's muck-rakers was secretary, while its moving spirit was Mr. Peary's press agent, Herbert L. Bridgman. In a desperate effort to help Peary, a cowardly side issue was forced through Professor Herschell Parker, who had been with me on the Mt. McKinley trip but who had turned back after becoming panic-stricken in the

as evident at the time everywhere-no fair result could be expected. And as to the widely printed Barrill affidavit-this carried on its face the story of pro-Peary bribery and conspiracy. I have since learned that for it $1,500 and other considerations were paid. Here was a self-con

a year I barely withstood starvation. I was now whirled about the country, daily delivering lectures, greeting thousands of people, buffeted by mobs of well-meaning beings, and compelled to attend dinners and receptions numbering two hundred in sixty days. The air hissed about m

my home and unable to defend myself, Dunkle and Loose swore falsely to having manufactured figures and observations under my direction. When I learned of this, much as it hurt me, I knew that the report which I had sent to Copenhagen would, if it did anything, disprove by the very figures in it the malicious lying document pub

e University of Copenhagen who examined my papers were neither personal friends nor members of a body financially interested in my quest. Their verdict was honest. Mr. P

I was declared a brazen cheat who had concocted the most colossal lie of ages whereby to hoax an entire world for gain. I was made the subject of cheap jokes. My name in antagonistic newspapers had become a synonym for

ory in a press which panders to the lowest of human emotions and delights in men's shame. When I realized how egregious, how frightful, how undeserved was all this, my soul writhed; when I saw clearly, with the perspective which on

ped over the Polar wastes with a will fired only by a personal ambition to succeed in a task where all the higher human powers were put to the test of fitness. That victory was honestly won. All that the achievement ever meant to me-the lure of it before I achieved it, the only satisfaction that remains since-is that it is a

manly rivals-those of the past and those of the future. But against the unjust charges which have been made against me, against the aspersions

as won by hard labor, by tremendous physical fortitude and endurance, and by

r a year's rest. By this time I knew that my enemies would have said all that was possible about me; t

t I did say was misquoted and distorted by a sensational press which found it profitable to add fuel to the controversy. Sometimes I feel that no man ever born has been so variedly, so persistently lied about, misrepresented, made the butt of such countless untruths as myself. When I conside

make, which Mr. Peary was unwillingly forced to make at the Congressional investigation, was construed throughout the country and widely heralded as a "confession," that garbled extracts were lifted from the context of my magazine story and their meaning distorted. In hundreds of newspapers I was represented as confessing to a fraudulent claim or as making a plea of insa

he power of Mr. Peary's friends. It is almost impossible in any condition for anyone to secure a refutation for an unfounded attack in the American papers. With the entire press of the country printing

to myself, in order to clear myself, in order that the truth about the discovery of the North Pole may be known by my people and in order that history may record its verdict upon a full, free and frank exposition. I do not addre

in that it is the inevitable mistake any man must make. To touch that spot would be an accident. That any other man has more accurately determined the Pole I do deny. That Mr. Peary reached the North Pole-or its environs-with as fair accuracy as was possible, I have never denied. That Mr. Peary was better fitted to reach the Pole, and better equipped to locate this mythical spot, I do not admit. In fact, I believe that, inasmuch as the purely scientific ascerta

shadow decreases or increases in length as the sun rises toward the meridian or descends, at the boreal center, where the sun circles the entire horizon at practically the same height during the entire day, one's shadow in this region of mystery is of the same length. In thi

l herein tell the story of an unfair and unworthy plot to ruin the reputation of an innocent man because of an achievement the full and prior credit of which was desired by a brutally selfish, brutally unscrupulous rival. I shall te

t me, of the charges made against me, and the reason for all of my own actions. So persistent, so world-wide has been the press campaign made by my enemies, and so egregious have the charges seemed against me, so multitudinous have the l

es exultant, with antagonistic press men awaiting me as some beast to be devoured, required a

remained silent. Titanic as is this effort of forcing fair play where biased abuse has reigned so long, I am confident of success. I am confident of the honesty an

E BOREA

HE WATERS OF THE ARCTIC SEAS-RECOLLECTION OF BOYHOOD AMBIT