Dr. Nansen As A Boy

As a boy, Fridtjof Nansen always lived in the closest communion with Nature, not only on the farm of Great Froen at West Aker, which belonged to his fatlier, Balder Fridtjof Nansen, an eminent lawyer, but as a youth whole days and nights would be spent by liim in tlie recesses of the woods of Nordmarken, where he lived a sort of Kobison Crusoe life, subsisting on a crust of bread and the spoil of his fishing rod, "while every work on travel and exploration was greedily read. After he had lieen two years at college the spirit of adventure ran too rampant in him to be Jonger restrained, so tliat he eagerly accepted the offer of the post of naturalist and zoölogist on board a whaler bound for an Arctic cruise. On his return the appointment of Curator to the Museum of Bergen awaited him. Ilere . he settled down for some years fairly contented to his microscope, and prosecutiog his researches so industriously as to make him quite an authority on parasitical fish-worms and general nerve structure.. Tlien the partially successful exploration efFected in Greenland by the veteran Snede Nordenskiöld set hia blood on lire to emulate the great trayeller by crosssing Greenland. Tlie details of that intrepid exploit, with the more recen and more extraordinary voyage of the Fram, ure too well known to be more tlian mentioned. Dr. Xansen has deservedly received the gold medals from almost all the geographical and ecientifio societies of Europe, while Royalty in his own country and in Eugland have shown him special marks of favour. It might not be out of place to state that Dr. Natisen is a good Euglish scholar and speaks that language fluently.