 there arose in our pathway a shrouded
human figure, very far larger in its proportions than any dweller among men. And
the hue of the skin of the figure was of the perfect whiteness of the snow.
 

                                      Note

The circumstances connected with the late sudden and distressing death of Mr.
Pym are already well known to the public through the medium of the daily press.
It is feared that the few remaining chapters which were to have completed his
narrative, and which were retained by him, while the above were in type, for the
purpose of revision, have been irrecoverably lost through the accident by which
he perished himself. This, however, may prove not to be the case, and the
papers, if ultimately found, will be given to the public.
    No means have been left untried to remedy the deficiency. The gentleman
whose name is mentioned in the preface, and who, from the statement there made,
might be supposed able to fill the vacuum, has declined the task - this, for
satisfactory reasons connected with the general inaccuracy of the details
afforded him, and his disbelief in the entire truth of the latter portions of
the narration. Peters, from whom some information might be expected, is still
alive, and a resident of Illinois, but cannot be met with at present. He may
hereafter be found, and will, no doubt, afford material for a conclusion of Mr.
Pym's account.
    The loss of two or three final chapters (for there were but two or three) is
the more deeply to be regretted, as, it cannot be doubted, they contained matter
relative to the Pole itself, or at least to regions in its very near proximity;
and as, too, the statements of the author in relation to these regions may
shortly be verified or contradicted by means of the governmental expedition now
preparing for the Southern Ocean.
    On one point in the narrative some remarks may well be offered; and it would
afford the writer of this appendix much pleasure if what he may here observe
should have a tendency to throw credit, in any degree, upon the very singular
pages now published. We allude to the chasms found in the island of Tsalal, and
to the whole of the figures upon pages 871, 872, 873.
    Mr. Pym has given the figures of the chasms without comment, and speaks
decidedly of the indentures found at the extremity of the most easterly of these
chasms as having but a fanciful resemblance to alphabetical characters, and, in
short, as being positively not such. This assertion is made in a manner so
simple, and sustained
