Interest in the Frozen North became so great, that a conference of nations was held in Hamburg, Germany, in 1879, to discuss plans by means of which knowledge of that part of the world might be advanced. Eleven countries were represented, and it was decided to send out expeditions and establish stations for the purpose of making scientific observations. Fifteen expeditions were sent out by different countries, and fourteen stations were established. These stations were known as the International Circumpolar stations, and their work was to be coöperative.
The United States decided to establish two stations, one at Point Barrow, Alaska, and the other in Lady Franklin bay. The command of the expedition to Point Barrow was given to Lieutenant Ray. Adolphus Washington Greely, a lieutenant in the United States Army, was offered command of the other, and when the enterprise was made national in 1881, he accepted the commission.
The arrangements necessary for the journey were soon made, and Greely and his companions sailed on the _Proteus_ to Newfoundland. They left that island on July 7, 1881, and headed for the north. The _Proteus_ sailed through Davis strait and Baffin bay, passing the wonderful “bird cliffs,” which rise perpendicularly for over a thousand feet out of the sea, and are broken only by narrow ledges. Neither Eskimo nor animal can reach these rocks, and here, safe from harm, the birds lay their eggs and hatch out their young by the tens of thousands. Greely’s men shot many birds and secured hundreds of eggs.
The _Proteus_ passed through Smith sound and Kennedy channel, and reached Lady Franklin bay in safety. She anchored at last in Discovery bay, on the coast of Grinnell land, where Greely and his men went ashore to select a place suitable for a camp, to be named Fort Conger. Then the _Proteus_ steamed away, leaving a small company of men alone in the Arctic solitude. But they were too busy to feel lonely, and began to work hard in order to make a comfortable home for themselves. The house was built of wood covered with tarred paper, and stations for the instruments were erected near at hand.
The cliffs around Discovery harbor rise from a hundred to a thousand feet in height and nearly surround the bay, which contains about twenty square miles of ice floe. Game was plentiful. Large flocks of eider ducks visited an open pool near by, and herds of musk oxen were to be seen in the distance, grazing quietly. The Arctic summer was at its height, and the slopes were covered with grasses, mosses, and buttercups.