INDUSTRIAL PROGRESS DURING THE YEAR 1874. Ixxxiii 



Zembla, and returned without having added any thing of 

 special interest to our knowledge of the far North. 



The most important geographical event of the year, as al- 

 readv referred to, is the safe return of the Austrian Polar ex- 

 pedition, which left on the Tegethoff \\\ 1872, and of which 

 nothing had been heard until quite recently. Several par- 

 ties were sent out, or proposed, during the present year 

 as a relief, and the services of the many Norwegian sailors 

 who annually visit the arctic seas for the purpose of captur- 

 ing the whale, seal, and walrus, were enlisted by the offer of 

 a reward of one hundred pounds sterling for the first news. 



As just remarked, this party left on board the steamer Te- 

 gethoff in June, 1872, and sailed from Tromso on the 13th of 

 July. On the 26th of August she parted company with the 

 yacht commanded by Count Wiltzec ; since which nothing 

 had been heard of her until the 3d of September, 1874, when 

 her officers and crew reached Vardo, in Norway.* It appears 

 that the vessel was beset in the ice off the northern end of 

 Nova Zembla tl e very day that she parted company with 

 Count Wiltzec ; and drifted for the next fourteen months, 

 until October, 1873, first in a northeasterly direction, and 

 then northwest. The expedition wintered in 1873 and 1874 

 in latitude 79 59', longitude 59 E. Snow huts were built 

 upon the ice, and the necessary preparations made for the 

 scientific work of the expedition. 



The most important discovery was that of land to the 

 north of Nova Zembla and northeast of Spitzbergen. This 

 was explored quite thoroughly as far north as 81 52', and 

 was seen to extend as far as 83. A large portion of this 

 land was covered with glaciers, sending up through the ice 

 conical peaks of dolomite rocks. 



The newly discovered country throughout its entire length 

 has been called Franz-Joseph's Land. 



The expedition set out on its return journey in three boat- 

 sledges, and proceeded first to the vicinity of the vessel, and 

 finding it still frozen up, they essayed to reach the mainland 

 of Northern Europe. It was not until the 15th of July that 

 they were fairly off, and not until the 15th of August that 



* It may here be remarked that this port has, it is said, been purchased 

 by the German Polar Exploration Society, as a starting-point and station 

 for its expeditions. 



