The Romance of the Unknown

New Zealand Times, Volume LII, Issue 12181, 4 July 1925, Page 11

The Romance of the Unknown

Work Still for Explorers

MUNDSEN flies out' boldly over the vast frozen spaces of the Arctic. His humming ’planes pass overhead, into the eye of the Midnight Sun, watched maybe bv some polar L hear upon a hummock of iec. In the tropic itingle near the Amazon

jungle near me Amazon a white uian is toiling and hacking hi& way far from his kin—ever pushing forward into the unknown. On the sheer precipices of a vast mountain a little group of muffled men struggles foot bv foot towards the glistening peaks, unconquered yet. What impels them? The romance of exploration, the iov of “pitting human strength and romance against Nature, the itch for knowledge? Whatever it be, it is a driving impulse deep rooted. And yet, though exploration is as old as the human race, great tracts of the world still remain unknown. Take the map of the world and glaiice at it. Bit by bit explorers from the time of the Phoenicians onwards have helped to piece together the great jig-

saw puzzle ot the map. All the broad outlines of the earth's surface, indeed, are known, and all that remains to ho done is the tilling in of details. But those details still constitute in themselves a vast area, if measured in the aggregate, and many expeditions are even now investigating the littleknown portions of the globe. The third, but not the final, attempt to reach the summit of Mount Everest, for instance, ha 3 recently been made, and now it is reported that the Germans and the Swiss will vie with the Koyal Geographical Society in. an effort to reach the summit first. But there are other secrets, still more interesting for the daring. In the hinterland of Tibet there is still a vast area which is but imperfectly known, and Western China and Central Asia both afford rich fields for explorers. Book further on the map!

The burning Libyan desert and the shadowy borderland of the Sudan and French equatorial Africa, with its forests, are as yet, too, a closed book to geographers, as also is the mountainous country of Bhutan and Southern Tibet. \ Another area of which little is known Is that of Manipur, lying to the eaet of Assam, the reputed liom» of chess And away up in the extreme north-east corner of the Asiatic continent, and lying close to the Polar Sea, is the barren and desolate waste of Anadyr. It is covered with snow for nine months in the year, but immense herds of reindeer are known to roam the where there are no civilised hunters. Still farther to the west we see the remote provinces of Eastern Persia, marching with the western frontier of .Afghanistan, little known and so little surveyed that significant white patents still appear in maps of the area. And again, to the south, across the waters of the Persian Gulf, lies the Robat al Khali, the “Great Empty Place” of the Arabian Peninsula. Frequent attempts have been made in recent years to penetrate into the unknown country but it has never yet been traversed, the absence of water presenting insuperable difficulties. What it holds, what secrets its solitude may guard no man yet knows. A line drawn from Aden to Moscat passes through the centre of this unexplored area, so far from civilisation.

The general character of the Arctic and Antarctic regions of course is known, but from their inaccessibility and the dangers and privations associated with their exploration, vast gaps remain upon which no human eye has restod. lit the New World, too. there arc white blanks in the great land masses lying to the north of the Canadian seaboard. The explorations of Stefaneson and others have drawn attention to these rdgione and somewhat highly coloured pictures have been drawn of

their economic potentialities. Still farther north there is believed to lie the problematical land situated somewhere in that vast unexplored area known as the Beaufort Sea. This is the region which Amundsen desires to examine, and his theories are supported in America, whence an expedition will set' forth within a few davs. The objective is a survey by air of the “blind spot’' on the map which represents one *f the great unexplored regions on the earth’s surface, and may again hold secrets of value. Let us glance now south of the equator. The chief area yet remaining to be explored "’here is that surrounding the head waters of the | mighty Amazon. At the present mo | ment a British expedition, led by t Colonel Fawcett, is engaged in examining this region, and it is reported that interesting evidences of an early civilisation have been discovered. Certainly this vast area of [ forest, jungle, and river affords roman- ■ the possibilities for the adventurous—- | and who knows wlmt tribes or buried i cities it may not contain? | The Antarctic regions probably con- | stitute, however, the greatest area on

the earth’s surface yet unexplored. Not even the fringe#? of this great continent have been delineated on the maps, and there are still thousands of miles of coastline to be filled in, much of which no human eye has seen. As regards the continent itself, i/little is known beyond the narrow ‘ribbon stretching from the Ross Sea to ihe Pole. Along this track Scott and Amundsen have accurately chartered tile main features of this great land mass, which culminates in a lofty plateau over 10,000 feet above sea level. With the exception of this narrow strip, however,' the: continent is represented by a blank space on our maps. One of the most closely guarded of Nature’s regions is New : Guinea;;; ’ In which Australia is vitally ‘ interested. In 1910 an expedition to* the interior of New Guinea - was'sent out by the Ornithologists’ Union. The object of the party was not achieved, but it was rewarded by the discovery of the Pigmies, who live' in the foothills. The average height of these little people is 4ft* 7m, and they are much hunted and harassed by the forest tribes. In February, 1911, after months of laborious work cutting their way through the forest and crossing streams, the party hacked its way to a clear space at a height of 5600 feet, and there was favoured with the view for which it had longed, and was able to fix the positions of the main peaks. Nearly five miles away stood Mount Godman, and beyond it the huge southern face of the range, 80 miles from east to west with a clear drop of nearly a mile and threequarters—by far the greatest precipice in the world. Behind this scarp rose the snow mountain, dominated by the glittering top of Mount Carstensz, nearly i 6,000 feet. Further advance was impossible, and , the party had to retrace its steps. Some idea of the miseries of the expedition can be gained from the fact that the food was bad and unsuitable for a tropical expedition, the stores being the surplus from the Shaokleton’s Anta retie expedition. Bully beef, pea soup, and pickles were scarcely the best diet in the stancesFinally, there remains in our own continent a number of considerable areas which have not yet been thoroughly explored.' Arnliem Land and the area in the north-west about to be explored by Mr Michael Terry’s party are two of these, and if ono looks even at the latest map of Australia, large blanks will be seen both to the north and south of the transcontinental railway. So there is plenty of ample work yet for the adventurous in seeking tho secrets that lie, as it were, beyond the hills.