Yachting in the Arctic Seas, Or, Notes of Five Voyages of Sport and Discovery in the Neighbourhood of Spitzbergen and Novaya Zemlya

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1876 edition. Excerpt: ... barentz sea and franz josef land. An account of ice and currents to the north, northeast, and north-west of Novaya Zemlya having already been incorporated with a description of the north part of that country, to complete the knowledge of the seas between Novaya Zemlya and Spitzbergen prior to 1869, it is only necessary to mention the voyages of Hudson, William de Vlamingh, and Wood.1 To the present narrative of the first voyage of exploration in late years, in the north of this Barentz Sea, and the attempt to penetrate the Polar pack between Novaya Zemlya and Spitzbergen, an allusion to the only voyages undertaken previous to it may form an appropriate preface. All these three men sailed with the same object, to reach the North Pole, and were alike unsuccessful. Hudson sailed directly from the Thames, and met the ice in lat. 75 29', on June 9th, 1608. Failing to make any way through it, he followed the edge of the ice without finding any opening in it till he sighted Novaya Zemlya at 72 25' north. 1 Barentz sailed from Bear Island to Novaya Zemlya, but kept always south of the 75 parallel; even then they were often 'forced with great peine and labour to lauere out of the ice.' William de Vlamingh in 1664, finding the north coast of Novaya Zemlya and the Kara Sea in its vicinity almost totally free from ice, at last directed his ship to the north-west, and, it is said, reached the latitude of 82 10', where he found the water getting gradually smoother, approaching, as we now conjecture, the lee of Franz Josef Land. Again, Wood, in June 1676, came in sight of the Polar pack in lat. 75 59', having sailed through an open sea about midway between Spitzbergen and Novaya Zemlya. Examining the ice like Hudson, it conducted him in a similar...