PEARY AND COOK.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 840, 11 June 1910, Page 5

PEARY AND COOK.

, e —. LEGAL ACTION REVIVES THE CONTROVERSY. By Tele^raDh—PrcM Association—Copyright London, June 9. Renter's Berlin correspondent states that Rudolph Franckc 1 (who accompanied Dr. Cook to North Greenland, and then turned back) ,is suing Commander Peary for £1000 as compensation for Dr. Cook's bearskins and walrus tusks. He alleges that Commander Peary refused to take him from Greenland unless lie handed over Cook's property,-, of which Francke owned half. ( DOUBTED IN HIS OWN LAND. The complete acceptance met with in England by Commander Peary (who claims that lie reached the North Pole in April last year) had its consummation ill his recent audience with King George, following on the lecture -before the Royal Geographical Society. Commander Peary's claim'meets with most opposition in his own country. A Washington message of March 10 stated: . f . i "Practically ) uuaiiiinously the Subcommittee of the Naval Committee-of the House of Representatives decided today 1 against honouring ' Rear-Admiral Peary until he submits proofs of his discovery of the North Pole. Congressman Alacon contributed to this result by declaring himself sceptical of Eear-Admiral Peary's claim. "The astonishing part of Rear-Admiral Peary's statement, argued Mr. Macon, was the -number of miles travelled every day after Captain Bartlett had left him, when he had no white man with him as a witness. His greatest marches were, singularly, all north;;of Captain Bart•it's campi _',';i!heui...jnvard lie claims to have averajMP 2.4 miles. a day until ho reached me Pole, -U miles a day on the way hack to Captain Bartlett's camp and 24.8 miles a dayfrom Bartlelt's camp to Cape Columbia.

"The greatest speed made before' Captain Bartlett .left him was f1.06 miles a day, so that he must have made nearly three rimes as great a s-peed after as before in order to reach the Pole.

"Air. iacon quptwl Sir Ernest Shackleton and others' to show that ten to twelve miles a day or slightly over were considered. the .limit of human endurance over Polar seas/',

With regard to the last paragraph in the Washington message, Sir Ernest Shackleton had had something to say. He told an English iuterviewer: "Knowing Peary's record and the preparations he made, one cannot have the slightest doubt about his achievement. Seeing that he has already shown his •observations to the National Geographical Society of America, and that they have accepted his claim, it would seem that again to ask for proof -implies distrust. "With reference to the doubt cast on the mileage accomplished by Peary, and the statement attributed to me that ten to twelve miles a day-or slightly rnoro were considered the limit of human endurance over Polar seas,-1 $ee no reason why Peary, who had his dogs with him," should not have done what he has claimed. The dogs must h-m- done .the pulling, for men could not.

"On my journey, front the Pole, • with the wind behind me, on five consecutive days,-1 did twenty, eighteen, twenty-two, twenty-six, and twenty-nine miles. At the end of the inarcli',- when worn out after foeinff out for 120 days, I .did one march of twenty-four miles,-and on the two following days traversed a total of thirty-nine miles, and that'without any sleep/' - '

hi British geographical circles (say? a London paper), the view is expressed that there is not the slightest doubt of the explorer's good ?ai(h. His record and character preclude such a possibility.