The _Yantic_ made a good passage home, and even then it would have been easy to equip and send out a special vessel to Cape Sabine, for whaling captains were all agreed that a boat leaving New York as late as September 19 could reach Cape Sabine in safety. General Hazen, the chief signalling-officer, entreated Lincoln to purchase and dispatch a vessel at once; nothing was done. Lieutenant Melville, of whom we shall have cause to say more in connection with the _Jeannette_ expedition, offered to take a party there himself; his offer was not accepted, and shortly afterwards Lincoln expressed his conviction that it was now too late. As events proved, Melville Bay was navigable that year for forty-five days after that “too late” was uttered, and many of Greely’s companions paid for the mistake with their lives. This story is one of the very few dark spots on the history of Arctic exploration. No one, of course, would dream of accusing either Lieutenant Garlington or the Secretary for War of wilfully sacrificing the lives of their fellow men, but it is extraordinary that, while they knew that there was the barest likelihood of Greely and his men starving to death on a barren and inhospitable shore where there was no chance of their obtaining food, they should have neglected to use their utmost effort to save them. CHAPTER XXV NORDENSKIÖLD AND HIS WORK Of all the men who have added to the world’s scientific knowledge of the Polar regions there is none who has made his name more famous than Adolph Erik Nordenskiöld. The data that he collected, and the discoveries that he made on his many voyages to the Arctic world have proved invaluable, and his explorations have not merely been rich in scientific and geographical results, but they have also benefited the mercantile world by opening up new fields for enterprise, and proving the practicability of routes which had always been regarded as absolutely hopeless.