In the following pages I have not attempted to elaborate on our experiences and observations. This I leave for a future work. My aim has been to select from my diary and notes such data as might prove of interest to the general reader. In my desire to condense this story into a single volume I have omitted much of the daily routine of life. I have also omitted a discussion of technical topics. There is no pretence made by me that this book contains all of the scientific data of the expedition. The observations, descriptions of specimens, and scientific deductions will be published in other channels. The Belgian Government has liberally set aside a sum sufficient to publish in proper form the scientific records, and a commission is at present occupied in making a preliminary study of the material with this end in view. We did not start out to mount the south pole, as we have been reported. Our aim was a less ambitious work of scientific exploration along the edge of the unknown. In this we were reasonably successful. My story, then, is not one of pole-chasing, with its many certain disappointments. It is a record of the first expedition to pass through the ordeal of the long antarctic night and its gloomy winter storms. It is, I hope, a contribution of new human experience in a new, inhuman world of ice. The illustrations in this book are made, with but a few exceptions, from photographs, and since these are the first photographic reproductions of antarctic life and scenes, it is hoped that they will be of value as records of the unknown south. In the color plates we have aimed to give a few examples of the daily touches of colour, which serve to relieve the awful monotony and glittering whiteness peculiar to the south polar regions. The vivid complexity of delicate shades of most scenes is impossible of imitation by the present means of the printer’s art, but the success attained by the artist, the engraver, and the printer in these reproductions has been an agreeable surprise to me. In the notices of my return from the antarctic, and in the story of the Belgian Antarctic Expedition, as published in the American newspapers, it has unintentionally been made to appear as if I desired to claim a major share of the credit for the results of this expedition. This I wish to disclaim. The credit of organising the expedition belongs to its Commander, Adrien de Gerlache; the honour of sending out the venture belongs to the enterprise of Belgian citizens. The fame and honour, which are the results of a successful expedition, belong to every member of the expedition. Every one, from the highest officer to the cabin-boy, has done his share of the work nobly and faithfully. Everyone, then, from the cabin to the forecastle, deserves equally the honorable mention which is the explorer’s only pay. FREDERICK A. COOK, M.D. 687 BUSHWICK AVENUE, BOROUGH OF BROOKLYN, NEW YORK.