ry for
a debt of ten pounds, and dying in the county jail. The mansion house
and its appurtenances were, as I have previously stated, destroyed,
excepting one small wing which now forms part of a farmhouse, and is
visible as you pass along the railway from Casterbridge to Ivel. The
outline of the old bowling-green is also distinctly to be seen.

This, then, is the reason why the only lawful marriage of Sir John, as
recorded in the obscure register at Havenpool, does not appear in the
pedigree of the house of Horseleigh.

[Illustration: Ye Ende.]

[_"THE EDGE OF THE FUTURE" SERIES._]

THE RACE TO THE NORTH POLE.

THE EXPEDITIONS OF NANSEN AND JACKSON.

BY HUGH ROBERT MILL, D.SC., Author of "The Realm of Nature."

INTRODUCTION.

Arctic enthusiasm is an intermittent fever, returning in almost
epidemic form after intervals of normal indifference. Twelve years ago
there was a wide-spread outbreak, but for the last ten years the
symptoms have never been so severe as to result in a great expedition.
If all goes well this summer there will be a renewed paroxysm; no less
than three new ventures northward being sent out by different routes
to converge on the pole.

It is refreshing, in this prosaic time, to recognize the power of pure
sentiment in the quest for glory. Polar research is a survival, or
rather an evolution, of knight-errantry, and our Childe Rolands
challenge the "Dark Tower of the North" as dauntlessly as ever their
forbears wound slug-horn at gate of enchanted castle. The "woe of
years" invests the quest with elements which redeem failure from
disgrace; but whoever succeeds in overcoming the difficulties that
have baffled all the "lost adventurers" will make the world ring with
his fame as it never rang before. We commonplace human beings are as
quick to see and prompt to appreciate heroic daring, perseverance, and
valor as ever were the dames of mythic Camelot; and the race for the
pole will be watched by the world with generous sympathy.

Incidentally the fresh Arctic journeys must secure much scientific
information, but that aspect of them appeals to the few. It is as a
display of the grandest powers of man in conflict with the tyranny of
his surroundings that Arctic travel appeals directly to the heart.
Since McClure, in 1850, forced the north-west passage from Bering
Strait to Baffin Bay, and Nordenskjold, in 1878, squeezed the "Vega"
through, between ice and land, from the North Cape to