Arctic exploration E-Book

Douglas Hoare

• Herausgeber: Librorium Editions
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Beschreibung

The story of the first few centuries of Arctic exploration can, of course, never be written. The early Norsemen, to whom must go the credit for most of the first discoveries, were a piratical race, and their many voyages were conducted, for the most part, in a strictly business-like spirit. Occasionally one of them would happen on a new country by accident, just as Naddod the Viking happened upon Iceland in 861 by being driven there by a gale while on his way to the Faroe Islands. Occasionally a curious adventurer would follow in the footsteps of one of these early discoverers, but no serious attempt was made to widen the field of knowledge thus opened up, unless the Norsemen saw their way to entering upon commercial relations with the natives, to the great disadvantage of the latter.

Leseprobe

ARCTIC EXPLORATION

SAILING THE ARCTIC SEAS

ARCTIC EXPLORATION

BYJ. DOUGLAS HOARE WITH EIGHTEEN ILLUSTRATIONS AND FOUR MAPS

1906

© 2023 Librorium Editions

ISBN : 9782385740207

ARCTIC EXPLORATION

CHAPTER IEARLY VOYAGES

T

he story of the first few centuries of Arctic exploration can, of course, never be written. The early Norsemen, to whom must go the credit for most of the first discoveries, were a piratical race, and their many voyages were conducted, for the most part, in a strictly business-like spirit. Occasionally one of them would happen on a new country by accident, just as Naddod the Viking happened upon Iceland in 861 by being driven there by a gale while on his way to the Faroe Islands. Occasionally a curious adventurer would follow in the footsteps of one of these early discoverers, but no serious attempt was made to widen the field of knowledge thus opened up, unless the Norsemen saw their way to entering upon commercial relations with the natives, to the great disadvantage of the latter.

AN OLD MAP OF THE POLAR REGIONSFROM NARBOROUGH’S “VOYAGES” (1694)The erroneous intersection of Greenland by Frobisher’s Strait should be especially noted

Rumours of the existence of Iceland, or Thule as it was then called, were first brought home by Pytheas, while Irish monks are known to have stayed there early in the ninth century, but probably the first attempt to colonise it was made by Thorold about a hundred years after Naddod’s visit. This worthy Viking, feeling it advisable to leave his native land after a quarrel with a relative, during the course of which the latter had been killed, set his course for Iceland, and made himself a new home there. Shortly afterwards his son Erik, who seems to have inherited his father’s taste for murder, followed him to his new abode, and later on, when on a voyage of adventure, set foot upon Greenland. Erik’s son, Leif, who was also of a roving disposition, sailed far westward in 100 A.D., and landed either on Newfoundland or at the mouth of the St Lawrence, thus anticipating the discovery of America by Columbus by nearly five hundred years.

It was not until the end of the fifteenth century that the first serious attempts at Arctic exploration were made by John Cabot and his son Sebastian. John Cabot was a Venetian, who settled at Bristol probably about the year 1474, and to him belongs the honour of being the first to suggest the possibility of finding a north-west passage to India. In 1496 he received a commission from Henry VII. to sail out for the discovery of countries and islands unknown to Christian peoples, and though the real object of his voyage, discreetly veiled beneath these purposely vague terms, was not attained, he immortalised his name by the discovery of Nova Scotia and Cape Breton Island. The history of the earlier Cabot voyages is sadly obscure, and was rendered more so by Sebastian himself, who in his later years seems to have claimed discoveries which properly belonged to his father. Sebastian is unquestionably the hero of his own account of the expedition of 1496, which is given by Hakluyt:—

“When news were brought that Don Christoval Colon (i.e. Christopher Columbus), the Genoese, had discovered the coasts of India, whereof was great talke in all the court of King Henry VII., who then reigned, insomuch that all men with great admiration affirmed it to be a thing more divine than humane to saile by the West into the East where spices growe, by a way that was never knowen before, by this fame and report there increased in my heart a great flame of desire to attempt some notable thing. And understanding by reason of the Sphere (i.e. globe) that if I should saile by way of the North-west I should by a shorter tract come into India, I thereupon caused the king to be advertised of my devise, who immediately commanded two Carvels to be furnished with all things appertayning to the voyage, which was as farre as I remember in the year 1496, in the beginning of Sommer. I began therefore to sail toward the North-west, not thinking to find any other land than that of Cathay and from thence to turn toward India; but after certaine days, I found that the land ranne towards the North, which was to me a great displeasure. Nevertheless, sayling along by the coast to see if I could finde any gulfe that turned, I found the lande still continent to the 58th degree under our Pole. And seeing that the coast turned toward the East, despairing to finde the passage, I turned backe againe, and sailed downe by the coast of that land toward the Equinoctiall (ever with intent to finde the saide passage to India) and came to that part of this firme lande which is nowe called Florida, where my victuals failing, I departed from thence and returned into England, where I found great tumults among the people, and preparation for warres in Scotland, by reason whereof there was no more consideration had to this voyage.”

John Cabot made a second expedition in 1498, and probably died soon after. Sebastian, who had accompanied his father on both his American voyages, finding the English Government little inclined to spend money on further exploration, transferred his services to the King of Spain, for whom he did excellent work by examining the coast of South America. In 1548, however, he returned to England, and Edward VI. did him the honour that was his just due, by settling on him the sum of 500 marks (£166, 13s. 4d.) a year for life, and, according to Hakluyt, creating him Grand Pilot. Never did a man deserve his honours more, for, by founding the company of Merchant Adventurers, of which he was the first governor, he did much to extend the foreign commerce of the nation, and, by fostering a spirit of enterprise, he paved the way for that immense success won by our sailors and merchants during the next century.

The first purely British expedition was that of Robert Thorne, of Bristol, at whose instigation, say Hall and Grafton, “King Henry VIII. sent out two fair ships, well manned and victualled, having in them divers cunning men to seek strange regions, and so they set forth out of the Thames, on the 20th day of May, in the nineteenth yere of his raigne, which was the yere of our Lord 1527.” The “fair ships” had as their objective no less a place than the North Pole, but the men do not seem to have been sufficiently “cunning” to make much headway against the difficulties that beset their path, and the chronicles of the time are singularly reticent concerning their doings.

The voyage of the Trinitie and Minion, which sailed in 1536, is one of the most disastrous on record. The expedition was sent out with a view to exploring North-West America, and it reached the coast of Newfoundland in safety. It seems, however, to have been hopelessly under-provisioned, and the men, having little to eat on board and finding themselves unable to supplement their scanty store on land, took to cannibalism, and would all have perished but for the timely arrival of a French ship, which they promptly set upon and misappropriated. We are not told what happened to the unfortunate Frenchmen, but Henry VIII. is reported to have compensated such as survived.

Hitherto the energies of our sailors had been principally devoted to discovering a north-west passage to India, Cathay, and the Indies. When, however, Cabot returned from Spain and was made “Governour of the mysterie and companie of the marchants adventurers for the discovery of regions, dominions, islands and places unknown,” he promptly showed how well fitted he was for that honourable post by suggesting that, as the voyages towards the north-west had not been attended by much success, it would not be amiss to try a change of tactics and to attempt to find a way to Cathay by the north-east. The idea was taken up enthusiastically, and, as this was the first extended maritime venture made by us in distant seas, the utmost care was exercised over the preparations. Three ships were specially built for the enterprise, and were fitted out in the most substantial manner possible. The admiral of the fleet, the Bona Esperanza, 120 tons, was placed under the command of Sir Hugh Willoughby, and carried thirty-five persons, who included six merchants. The Edward Bonaventure, 160 tons, was commanded by Captain Richard Chancellor, her company consisting of fifty, including two merchants; and the Bona Confidentia, 90 tons, was commanded by Cornelius Durfourth, and carried twenty-eight souls, also including two merchants. These three ships sailed from Ratcliffe on May 20, and, after tracing the coast of Norway, rounded the North Cape in company. Here a storm separated the Bonaventure from her sister ships, and, fortunately for her and her company, drove her to Vardö, in Norway. Willoughby and his two ships succeeded in making the coast of Lapland, and spent the winter on the desolate coast of the Kola Peninsula. In those days, unfortunately, but little was known of the art and science of wintering in the Arctic regions, and every member of the company perished miserably of scurvy.

Chancellor, after waiting awhile at Vardö in the hope that the rest of the fleet would join him there, determined to push on on his own account, and he eventually succeeded in reaching the north coast of Russia. The intelligence of his arrival was conveyed to the Czar, Ivan Vasilovich, who was so much interested in what he heard that he invited him to Moscow. There Chancellor spent the winter, and with such ardour did he forward the interests of his country, that he laid the foundations of that great trade between England and Russia which has flourished ever since. It is worthy of note that his first landing place is now marked by the great seaport of Archangel.

Chancellor’s second expedition was less fortunate, for the gallant sailor lost his life in his attempt to continue his work. He reached Russia in safety, and once more repaired to Moscow, where he continued the negotiations which he had previously begun. While returning home, however, his ship was wrecked in Pitsligo Bay on the east coast of Scotland and he was drowned.

The expedition of Chancellor and Willoughby had, of course, been primarily sent out with a view to finding a north-east passage to China, and these negotiations with Russia were a side issue not originally contemplated by its promoters. Consequently, while Chancellor was away on his second voyage, the Company of Merchants Adventurers equipped a second expedition for the discovery of the North-East Passage, which they placed under the command of Stephen Burrough. The Searchthrift, as the ship was named, set sail on April 23, 1556, but it was stopped by fog and ice, and Burrough was obliged to return to England without accomplishing his mission, though he succeeded in discovering Nova Zembla.

The next English mariner to win fame for himself by his adventures in the Arctic seas was Martin Frobisher, who, under the auspices of Queen Elizabeth, the Earl of Warwick, a well-known merchant named Lok and others, fitted out a fleet of three cockle-shells, the united burden of which was only 73 tons, and set sail in 1576, with intent to discover the North-West Passage. The chief result of Frobisher’s voyage was a vast mass of very misleading information. On reaching Davis Strait he came to the conclusion that it bisected Greenland, an error which retained its place in the maps for some three centuries. In the middle of the strait he discovered an island which did not exist, while he brought home with him the interesting information that large deposits of gold existed on the shores which he had visited. On the strength of this all sorts of plans for working these deposits were taken up, which only ended in the financial loss and bitter disappointment of their promoters. Frobisher undertook the command of two subsequent expeditions, but neither of them resulted in any discoveries of much value. His name, however, will always be kept alive by the discovery of Frobisher and Hudson Straits, both of which he entered on his first journey.

We now come to by far the most important of these early voyages, namely that made by John Davis, of Sandridge, in 1585. Davis was a splendid old sea-dog of the finest type—shrewd, patient, and of absolutely indomitable courage. So high was his reputation, that when a number of merchants, headed by William Saunderson, determined to fit out a new expedition for the discovery of the North-West Passage, they offered him the command, and their offer was promptly accepted. The expedition, which consisted of two ships, the Sunshine, of 50 tons, and carrying twenty-three men, and the Moonshine, 35 tons, and carrying nineteen men, started on June 7, and by July 19 it was off the south-east coast of Greenland, where Davis heard for the first time the grinding together of the great icepacks. The shore looked so barren and forbidding—“lothsome” is the epithet which Davis applied to it—that he named it “Desolation.” Rounding the southern point of Greenland and bearing northward, he soon reached lat. 64°, where he moored his ships among some “green and pleasant isles,” inhabited by natives who were very friendly disposed and quite ready to trade with him. From these he learnt that there was a great sea towards the north and west, so he set sail and shaped his course W.N.W., expecting to get to China. Crossing the strait which now bears his name, he sighted land in 66° 40′ and anchored in Exeter Sound. The hill above them they named Mount Raleigh; the foreland to the north, Cape Dyer; and that to the south, Cape Walsingham—names which they still bear. The season was too far advanced for him to attempt to explore the sound, but he discovered the wealth of those regions in whales, seals, and deerskins—a discovery which, it need hardly be said, was very highly valued by the merchants who had equipped the expedition.

As was only natural, both Davis and his patrons were anxious to continue the discoveries thus auspiciously begun, and May 7, 1586, saw him starting on his second expedition, his fleet strengthened by the addition of the Merimade, a ship of 120 tons. She did not prove of very much service, however, for she deserted in lat. 66°, and Davis went on his way without her. He did not succeed in adding anything of value to his discoveries of the previous year, merely coasting southward along Labrador, without observing the entrance to Hudson Strait.

Davis’s third expedition left on May 19, 1587, and consisted of three ships, the Elizabeth, the Sunshine, and the Ellen. On reaching lat. 67° 40′ he left two of his ships to prosecute fishing, and sailed on by himself on a voyage of discovery. He came, as he tells us himself, “to the lat. of 75°, in a great sea, free from ice, coasting the western shore of Desolation.... Then I departed from that coast, thinking to discover the north parts of America. And after I had sailed toward the west near forty leagues, I fell upon a great bank of ice. The wind being north, and blew much, I was constrained to coast towards the south, not seeing any shore west from me. Neither was there any ice towards the north, but a great sea, free, large, very salt and blue, and of an unsearchable depth. So coasting towards the south, I came to the place where I left the ships to fish, but found them not. Thus being forsaken and left in this distress, referring myself to the merciful providence of God, I shaped my course for England, and unhoped for of any, God alone relieving me, I arrived at Dartmouth. By this last discovery it seemed most manifest that the passage was free and without impediment toward the north; but by reason of the Spanish fleet, and unfortunate time of Master Secretary’s death, the voyage was omitted, and never since attempted.” So ended the Arctic voyages of John Davis. “The discoveries which he made ...,” says Sir John Ross, “proved of great commercial importance; since to him, more than to any preceding or subsequent navigator, has the whale fishery been indebted.”

In the meantime interest in the North-East Passage had by no means subsided; indeed, it had actually been quickened by Philip II.’s accession to the throne of Portugal and by the consequent fact that Spain and Portugal, not content with already holding the monopoly of the route to the East, attempted to make their influence felt upon the trade operations of the nations of Northern Europe. It was in 1580 that Arthur Pet, in the George, and Charles Jackson, in the William, sailed from England under the auspices of the Muscovy Company, with instructions to push as far east as they possibly could. The expedition was singularly ill-found, for the burden of the George was only 40 tons, her crew consisting of nine men and a boy, while the William was but half the size of her sister ship, and carried a crew of five men and a boy. The adventurers, however, made light of the difficulties that beset them, and, after making Nova Zembla in the neighbourhood of the South Goose Cape, they turned south and, coasting along Waigat Island, entered the mouth of the Pechora. Thence they pushed their way into the Kara Sea, being the first sailors from Western Europe who ever achieved such a feat.

The Muscovy Company does not seem to have considered it worth its while to proceed with the exploration of these unattractive regions, but the Dutch, who were no less anxious than the English to find a North-East Passage, sent out in 1594 an expedition which consisted of three ships, commanded by Willem Barents, Nay, and Tetgales. Barents attempted to find a passage round the north of Nova Zembla, while his companions turned south and made their way into the Kara Sea. The reports which these pioneers brought home with them so encouraged their fellow-countrymen, that they were sent off with a fleet of seven ships in the following year to continue their discoveries. This expedition penetrated a little further along the coast, but it by no means succeeded in fulfilling its mission, and the States-General became rather chary of spending any more money upon the venture. Accordingly they contented themselves with offering a large reward to any person or persons who could find a practicable passage to China, and left it to private enterprise to do the rest. The result of this step was that a company of merchants fitted out two ships of discovery in 1596, and gave the command of one of them to John Cornelius Ryp and of the other to Heemskeerck, appointing Barents chief pilot to the latter. On June 9 they discovered an island which they called Bear Island, in memory of a terrific encounter that they had with a polar bear there. They now found that their progress eastwards was checked by ice, and they accordingly stood north, with the result that it fell to their lot to be the discoverers of Spitzbergen. They spent two days in a bay which appears to have been that known as Fair Haven, and then, after an ineffectual attempt to push further north, they returned to Bear Island, where, owing to a difference of opinion as to the best course to pursue, they parted company, Ryp revisiting the coast of Spitzbergen, while Barents set his course for Nova Zembla. We may mention parenthetically that Heemskeerck was not himself a sailor, and that, in consequence, the lion’s share of the honours which this expedition earned has always been given to Barents, on whom the navigation of the ship necessarily devolved.

STRANDED IN NOVA ZEMBLA

The rest of the story of this unfortunate voyage is one of terrible trials borne with heroic fortitude. While coasting along the shore of Nova Zembla, Barents suddenly found himself in the midst of heavy ice, and time after time his ship only just escaped destruction by the squeezing together of the floes. His duty to his employers always being uppermost in his mind, he bravely attempted to push on to the east, but he soon found that that was impossible, and that all his efforts must be directed towards getting his ship home. As he drew near the shore, however, in the hope of finding a little open water there, the ice bore down upon it, crushed his boats to pieces and almost annihilated his ship. To add to his misfortunes, a northerly gale arose, which placed him in an even more dangerous position than before. He now found himself to the east of the island in an inlet which he named Ice Haven, but which is now called Barents Bay, with his retreat cut off both to the north and to the south. There was nothing for him to do, therefore, but to make the most of an exceedingly bad business and spend the winter where he was. Now it must be remembered that no traveller had ever yet passed a winter in the Arctic regions, and that Barents and his men were totally unprepared for such an emergency. They had little food, less fuel, no proper clothes and, last but by no means least, their ship was not suited for a winter abode. In the midst of their misfortunes, however, they kept up their hearts, and instantly set about building a hut wherein they could spend the long, dark months.

Fortunately for them there was an abundance of driftwood on the island “driven upon the shoare, either from Tartaria, Muscovia, or elsewhere, for there was none growing upon that land, wherewith, as if God had purposely sent them to us, we were much comforted.” This driftwood lay at a distance of some eight miles from the site of this house, and the labour of fetching it was enhanced by the darkness which was now setting in, and by the ferocity of the bears which haunted the neighbourhood and were a constant source of danger to the party. The Dutchmen, however, worked with a will, and by October 24 they had moved into their new abode, one of the features of which was a wine cask, with a square opening cut in its side, which was set up in a corner and used as a bath.

The bears afforded them some fresh meat up till November 3, when they and the sun disappeared at one and the same time. After this they occasionally succeeded in trapping foxes, but the cold was so intense that they were often unable to venture out of the house for days together. “It blew so hard and snowed so fast,” writes Gerrit de Veer, the chronicler of the expedition, “that we should have smothered if we had gone out into the air; and to speake truth, it had not been possible for any man to have gone one ship’s length, though his life had laine thereon; for it was not possible for us to go out of the house. One of our men made a hole open at one of our doores ... but found it so hard wether that he stayed not long, and told us that it had snowed so much that the snow lay higher than our house.” Again, “It frose so hard that as we put a nayle into our mouths (as when men worke carpenter’s worke they use to doe), there would ice hang thereon when we tooke it out againe, and made the blood follow.” Or, “It was so extreme cold that the fire almost caste no heate; for as we put our feete to the fire, we burnt our stockings before we could feele the heate.... And, which is more, if we had not sooner smelt than felt them, we should have burnt them quite away ere we had knowne it.” De Veer also tells us that the clothes on the backs even of those who sat near the fire were frequently covered with hoar-frost, and that the beer and all the spirits were frozen solid. Yet in the midst of all this he was able to make the following entry in his journal: “We alwaies trusted in God that hee would deliver us from thence towards sommer time either one way or another.... We comforted each other giving God thanks that the hardest time of the winter was passed, being in good hope that we should live to talke of those things at home in our owne country.” It was in this spirit of patient resignation that the brave Dutchmen met all their troubles.

Even when the sun returned it brought them but little relief from their sufferings, for the intensity of the cold seemed to increase, and there was no hope that the ice in their harbour would break up early. The ship was so badly damaged that she could not survive the voyage home, so they set about repairing the boats as best they could, with a view to crossing in them the thousand miles of sea that lay between them and Lapland. At last the time came for them to make their departure, but Barents was now so ill that he had to be taken to the boat on a sledge. His courage, however, was still indomitable, as this passage in De Veer’s account shows: “Being at the Ice Point the maister called to William Barents to know how he did, and William Barents made answer and said, Quite well, mate. I still hope to be able to run before we get to Wardhuus. Then he spak to me and said: Gerrit, if we are near the Ice Point, just lift me up again. I must see that point once more.” His courage, however, was greater than his strength, and on June 20, six days after the start, the end came. We quote our chronicler once more: “William Barents looked at my little chart, which I had made of our voyage, and we had some discussion about it; at last he laid away the card and spak unto me saying, Gerrit, give me something to drink and he had no sooner drunke but he was taken with so sodain a qualme, that he turned his eies in his head and died presently. The death of William Barents put us in no small discomfort, as being the chiefe guide and onely pilot on whom we reposed ourselves next under God; but we could not strive against God, and therefore we must be content.”

The sufferings of the party of fifteen on their terrible voyage over the stormy and ice-laden sea were scarcely less terrible than those which they had endured on the island. Such was their courage and determination, however, that they at last reached Lapland in safety, where they had the satisfaction of finding Cornelius Ryp, on whose vessel they were conveyed back to Holland.

CHAPTER IIFROM HUDSON TO PHIPPS AND NELSON

W

ith the voyages of Weymouth, Knight, and Hall, which occupied the first few years of the seventeenth century, we need not concern ourselves at all, for they resulted in no discoveries of any importance. In the year 1607, however, Henry Hudson started off on the first of that series of travels by which his name became famous, and during the course of which he succeeded in carrying the British flag to places that had never before been trodden by the foot of civilised man.

As has already been seen, the north-west and north-east passages to the Indies had been tried and found wanting. British merchants, however, were by no means disposed to let Spain and Portugal retain their lucrative monopoly without making a struggle to wrest it from them, so they determined to send out a fresh expedition which should attempt to force its way to the land of gems and spices over the North Pole itself. The command of this expedition was entrusted to Henry Hudson, a seaman of such daring and skill that he was well able to accomplish the work if it lay within the power of a human being to do so. Hudson started off from the Thames on May 1, 1607, in a small barque which was manned by ten men and a boy, and made direct for the east coast of Greenland. By June 22 he had reached lat. 72° 38′, where he discovered the land which still bears his name, the chief promontory of which he named Cape Hold-with-Hope. He then set his course for Spitzbergen, which, as we have seen, had been first sighted by Barents eleven years earlier, and there he reached the high latitude of 80° 23′. His provisions being now nearly exhausted, he was obliged to return home.

On his second voyage he attempted to discover a north-east passage round Nova Zembla, but was so hampered by ice that he was unable to proceed far on his way, while the only geographic result of his third voyage was the discovery of the Hudson River. These early expeditions, however, though they achieved little in the way of discovery, proved of great commercial value, for they gave rise to the great Spitzbergen whale fishery.

Hudson’s fourth and last voyage, that of 1610, was organised by Sir John Wolstenholm and Sir Dudley Digges, who were convinced of the existence of the North-West Passage, and felt that Hudson was the man to find it. Accordingly, Hudson sailed on April 17 in the Discovery, a ship of 55 tons, which was provisioned for six months. By June 9 he had reached Frobisher Strait, and here a contrary wind arose which compelled him to ply westward into Hudson’s Bay. Several British seamen had already visited the mouth of the strait, and it is believed that Portuguese fishermen had actually entered the bay; but the terrible circumstances which attended Hudson’s voyage to it made it only natural that it should be named after him in commemoration of his achievements and his fate.

The Discovery had penetrated the bay to a distance of over three hundred miles further than ever an English ship had penetrated it before when she was beset by ice, and all chance of retreat was cut off. As we have already seen, she was only provisioned for six months, and the unfortunate crew found themselves, in consequence, with starvation staring them in the face. Hudson, fortunately, was a man of resource, and he lost no time in organising hunting and fishing parties which provided his party with sufficient provisions to tide over the winter. Had his crew remained faithful to him all might have been well, but disaffection broke out early in the winter, which, gathering force as the store of provisions grew more and more scanty, broke out into open mutiny in the spring. The ringleaders were the former mate and boatswain, whom Hudson had been obliged to displace for using improper language, and a young man named Greene, a protégé of Hudson, who repaid his benefactor’s kindness by deserting him when he most needed friends. These men, seeing that when the ship broke out of winter quarters in June there were barely fourteen days’ provisions left for the whole crew, determined to place Hudson and eight other men in a boat, and, leaving them to shift for themselves, to sail home for England. This heartless plan was promptly carried into execution. Hudson was seized and bound when he came out of his cabin, and with five sick men, John Hudson and John King, the carpenter, who bravely refused to join the mutineers, was thrown into a boat and deserted. Of the unfortunate castaways nothing more was ever heard, and the most careful search of Sir Thomas Button, who examined the whole of the western shore of the bay, failed to discover any clue to their fate. Of the mutineers, Greene and four others were killed in a fight with the natives, while the rest only just succeeded in reaching England.

The voyages of Hall in 1612 and Gibbons in 1614 did not result in much, but in 1615 William Baffin started out on the first of his two expeditions which were destined to add so much to the world’s store of knowledge of the Arctic seas. Baffin, who was described by Sherard Osborn as “the ablest, the prince of Arctic navigators,” was in 1615 appointed by the Merchants Adventurers pilot and associate to Richard Bylot, of the Discovery, which was now to make her fourth voyage in search of the North-West Passage. Making first for Hudson Strait, they soon discovered that they were being led into a blind alley. As the conditions, however, did not permit them to extend their voyage much that season, they were obliged to return home. In the following year, however, they were sent out once more by the Merchants Adventurers, and on this occasion they determined to push on north along the coast of Greenland. On May 30 they reached Sanderson’s Hope, Davis’s farthest point, and there they entered upon an entirely new field of discovery. With such energy did they apply themselves to the work that they had crossed Melville Bay by the beginning of June, and were sailing merrily on their way past Cape York, Cape Dudley Digges, and Whale Sound. At last, when they had exceeded Davis’s farthest north by over three hundred miles, their triumphant career was stopped at the entrance to Smith Sound, within sight of Cape Alexander. This latitude, 77° 45′, remained unequalled for over two centuries.

Unable to proceed any further to the north, Baffin and Bylot determined to sail south-west, and to see if they could not add to their growing list of discoveries on their homeward journey. Their hopes were amply fulfilled, for on July 12 they found themselves off the entrance to Lancaster Sound, which was the gate, as it afterwards proved, to the North-West Passage. The ice, unfortunately, did not permit them to enter the Sound, so they made for the coast of Greenland, where they rested their men prior to their return to England.

For the next hundred years or so very little was done in the way of Arctic discovery. A Dane of the name of Jens Munk started out to seek for the North-West Passage, and succeeded in making a few discoveries in Hudson’s Bay. In 1631, again, Captain Luke, alias “North-West,” Fox sallied forth on the same mission, bearing with him an epistle from the King of England to the Emperor of Japan, which, however, remained undelivered. The work which he did was not of much value, but he made up for this deficiency by writing a very humorous account of his experiences. Captain James, who went exploring in the same year, seems to have been dogged by ill-luck from the beginning to the end of his voyage, and Barrow describes his narrative of it as “a book of lamentation and weeping and great mourning.”

Though, however, very little was done in the way of exploration during the second half of the seventeenth century, great strides were made in the development of the country already explored by the formation of the famous Hudson Bay Company, which for two hundred years did a tremendous trade in Northern Canada. The inception of this Company was mostly due to a certain French Canadian of the name of Grosseliez, who, after an ineffectual attempt to induce the French Government to consider his schemes for founding a great industry, came to England, where he obtained the ear of Prince Rupert. The Prince sailed for Hudson Bay with Grosseliez, saw the possibilities of the country, and obtained from King Charles a charter, dated 1669, which conferred on him and his associates, exclusively, all the trade, land, and territories in Hudson’s Bay. The charter further ordained that they should use their best endeavours to find a passage to the South Sea, but the Company soon became so rich from its trade that it seems to have conveniently forgotten this clause.

Occasionally, it is true, it attempted to do something in the way of exploration, but these efforts were for the most part only half-hearted, and resulted in little. In 1719, for example, James Knight, allured by reports of mines of pure copper by a great river to the north, gave the Company to understand that he would call upon the authorities to examine their charter unless they arranged an expedition and appointed him its leader.

Very reluctantly they consented to do as he wished, and equipped two ships for the purpose of surveying the northern coast of their territories. Not a single member of the expedition returned, and nothing was known of their fate until, forty years later, a quantity of wreckage was found on Marble Island.

With the exception of Middleton’s expedition of 1741, during the course of which Wager Inlet, Repulse Bay, and Frozen Strait were discovered, nothing much more was done in the way of Arctic exploration for the next fifty years. In 1769, however, the Company determined to make another effort to find the mines of copper of which the natives brought so glowing an account, and with this end in view they sent out an overland expedition under the command of Samuel Hearne. This expedition, which started out in November, was a complete failure, because it began its work too late in the year, while the second expedition, which left in February, failed because the preparations were inadequate. Warned by these two experiences, Hearne sallied forth once more in December 1670, and on this occasion he claimed to have found the mouth of the Coppermine River. His observations, however, were rather hazy, and it is doubtful whether he really reached the Polar Sea. The end of his journey was marred by an unfortunate collision between his Indian guides and a tribe of Eskimos, during the course of which all the unfortunate natives were massacred. The effects of this incident were to be felt later on, when Franklin, visiting those inhospitable shores with his gallant companions, was regarded with such suspicion by the Eskimos that he could hardly obtain that assistance which he so sorely needed.

One other early attempt to reach the Polar Sea by the land route deserves to be recorded: that of Alexander—afterwards Sir Alexander—Mackenzie, the discoverer of the river which bears his name. Having been led to believe by the accounts of Indians that the sea could be reached by a large river issuing from the Great Slave Lake, he determined to test the story himself, and set out on June 3, 1789. The difficulties in his way were innumerable, for not only was the river broken up by dangerous rapids, but it was only after infinite trouble that he could induce any guides to accompany him, for the natives believed the river to be peopled by monsters, who were ready to devour the unwary traveller without the least provocation. However, he succeeded in reaching the sea near Whale Island, and had the satisfaction of knowing that the tales of the Indians were true, though he was unable to use his knowledge for any practical purpose.

Meanwhile, Russia was busily opening up the north-east coast of Siberia, partly with a view to getting some control over the unmanageable Chukches, the only Siberian tribe who succeeded in resisting their somewhat rough and ready methods, and partly with a view to developing trade in that direction and to discovering whether or not the Asiatic and American continents were united. Many expeditions set out with these ends in view, among them being those of Ignatieff, Deshneff, Alexieff, and Ankudinoff, but of these it is impossible to give a detailed account here, and we need not take up the story of exploration in these regions until 1725, when the Great Northern Expedition, conceived by Peter the Great and carried into execution by the Empress Anne, set forth under the command of Vitus Bering, a Dane in the Russian service.

Immense difficulties had to be overcome before the expedition could start at all. Long overland journeys had to be made across Siberia, supplies had to be accumulated at Okhotsk and a vessel had to be built there, with the result that it was not until the end of June, 1727, that Spanberg, Bering’s assistant, was able to sail for Bolsheretsk in the Fortuna. Here more supplies had to be accumulated and a second ship built, which involved a delay of yet another year. At last, however, on July 24, 1728, Bering sailed gaily down the Kamchatka River, in the Gabriel, on his voyage of exploration. The preparations had extended over more than three years, and the voyage occupied about seven weeks, during which no discoveries whatever were made, so that the game seems to have been hardly worth the rather expensive candle. During the following summer he sallied out of his harbour once more, but he does not seem to have prosecuted his work with very much ardour, for he returned at the end of three days, during which he had sailed about a hundred miles. He then made his way to St Petersburg.

The Empress Anne seems to have been easily pleased, for although Bering had been away for five years and had accomplished nothing whatever, she gave orders that a second and even larger expedition should be placed under his command. The preparations for this voyage occupied some seven years, but at last, in September 1740, Bering was ready to start, and before winter closed in upon him he succeeded in rounding Kamchatka and reaching Avatcha, now known as Petropaulovsk; not a very remarkable voyage, perhaps, but a step in the right direction. There he spent the winter, and in June of the following year he started out in the St Peter, accompanied by the St Paul, under the command of Tschirikoff. Even now, however, he could not succeed in overcoming his passion for dawdling, and much valuable time was wasted in searching for the land of Gama, which, in point of fact, did not exist. At last, however, the two ships set their course north-east, and a few days later they parted company during a heavy fog. Both of them succeeded in making America, a feat, however, which had already been accomplished by Gwosdef during Bering’s absence at St Petersburg. Tschirikoff made the American coast on July 26, and after some exciting experiences, during which two parties who were sent ashore to explore were completely lost, he returned in safety to Petropaulovsk. Bering, who reached America three days later than his companion, was less fortunate. Caught by contrary winds and heavy gales, his vessel was ultimately stranded on Bering Island, where she broke up. Her commander, utterly disheartened, refused to eat or drink or to take shelter in the hut which had been constructed of driftwood, with the result that he died on December 19. The command of the party now devolved on Lieutenant Waxell, who, ably assisted by a brilliant young naturalist, named Steller, succeeded in bringing the party safely out of its quandary. Their stay on the island, though it was miserable in the extreme, had its compensations, for they found that the place abounded in the rare blue fox and the no less valuable sea-otter, of the skins of which the men secured such quantities that they took twenty thousand pounds’ worth home to Russia.

Bering did not succeed in discovering either the sea or the strait which have been named after him, but he mapped out a large tract of the Asiatic coast with some accuracy and opened up a trade which proved to be of immense value.

Up to the middle of the second half of the eighteenth century the efforts of navigators had, for the most part, been directed to finding a passage to the Indies either by the north-western or by the north-eastern route. Robert Thorne, it is true, had come forward with a bold plan for attempting to sail across the North Pole, but he had not succeeded in getting very far on his way, and the idea had been allowed to lapse. In 1773, however, the Earl of Sandwich, then First Lord of the Admiralty, having been approached upon the subject by the Royal Society, suggested to George III. that an expedition should be sent out to discover how far it was possible to sail in the direction of the Pole. The King was pleased with the idea, and preparations for the venture were at once set on foot. The Racehorse and the Carcase, two of the strongest ships of the day, were selected as being best suited for the purpose, and were fitted out as the ideas of the time dictated. The command was entrusted to Captain Constantine John Phipps, afterwards the second Lord Mulgrave, Captain Skiffington Lutwidge was appointed second in command, two masters of Greenland ships were attached to the expedition as pilots, and an astronomer, with all the latest instruments, was recommended by the Board of Longitude.

So far as actual achievements were concerned, there is nothing much to be recorded. Phipps was unfortunate in his year, and north of Spitzbergen he found a solid wall of ice which it was quite impossible for him to penetrate. He had the satisfaction, however, of reaching lat. 80° 48 N., a higher point than any of his predecessors. One episode deserves to be noticed as it came near causing the death of Nelson, who was serving in the humble capacity of captain’s coxswain. “One night,” says Southey, “during the mid-watch, he stole from the ship with one of his comrades, taking advantage of a rising fog, and set out over the ice in pursuit of a bear. It was not long before they were missed. The fog thickened, and Captain Lutwidge and his officers became exceedingly alarmed for his safety. Between three and four in the morning the weather cleared, and the two adventurers were seen, at a considerable distance from the ship, attacking a huge bear. The signal for them to return was immediately made; Nelson’s comrade called upon him to obey it, but in vain. His musket had flashed in the pan, their ammunition was expended, and a chasm in the ice, which divided him from the bear, probably preserved his life. ‘Never mind,’ he cried, ‘do but let me get a blow at the devil with the butt-end of my musket, and we shall have him.’ Captain Lutwidge, however, seeing his danger, fired a gun, which had the desired effect of frightening the beast; and the boy then returned, somewhat afraid of the consequences of his trespass. The captain reprimanded him sternly for conduct so unworthy of the office which he filled, and desired to know what motive he could have for hunting a bear. ‘Sir,’ said he, pouting his lip, as he was wont to do when agitated, ‘I wished to kill the bear that I might carry the skin to my father.’”