56 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



Ryp in command of the other, sailed north past Bear Island to Spitz- 

 bergen, and in following its shores, then explored for the first time, 

 reached a latitude of close on 80 1ST. Even this high northing was 

 surpassed, however, by Henry Hudson in 1607, who, in a little vessel 

 of 80 tons, the Hopewell, followed the Spitzbergen coast to a point 

 by dead reckoning 81 1ST. Land was stated to have been seen as far 

 north as 82, but either the reckoning must have been erroneous or ice 

 must have been mistaken for land. In 1612, however, Jonas Poole 

 met at Spitzbergen Thomas Marmaduke, of Hull, in the Hopewell, who, 

 Poole states, sailed as far north as 82, two degrees beyond Hakluyt's 

 Headland. If this statement is well founded, no further advance 

 towards the Pole was made in this or any other direction that is, no 

 well-authenticated advance for considerably over 200 years. But if 

 Marmaduke 's claim is allowed, so must be the claims of the Dutch and 

 other whalers, large numbers of whom for many long years thought 

 nothing of passing 80 N. latitude, and in favorable seasons may 

 possibly have reached a degree or two higher. Confining our attention, 

 however, to authenticated records, and remembering that the highest 

 northing calculated from observations that was reached by Hudson was 

 8023', we may mention, in this brief record of the stages passed in 

 the journey northwards, the expedition sent out by the Admiralty in 

 1773 under Captain J. C. Phipps (afterwards Lord Mulgrave). Phipps 

 reached 8048' N. latitude off the northwest coast of Spitzbergen. It 

 is interesting to note that this was the polar expedition on which Nelson 

 served. A more marked advance was made in 1806, when the famous 

 whaler, William Scoresby, was able to advance good proof that he had 

 reached 81 30' N. latitude in the Spitzbergen Sea. 



But it was reserved for Lieutenant W. E. Parry far to outdistance 

 all his predecessors in the work of north polar exploration. Parry set 

 sail in the Hecla in 1827, and making Trureaberg Bay, on the north 

 coast of Spitzbergen, his base of operations, started northwards with 

 two boats, which were fitted with steel-shod runners so that they might 

 serve as sledges. In spite of the toilsome nature of the journey, he 

 and his men pushed over the ice, piled with great blocks and bristling 

 with splinters which pierced through boots and feet, to latitude 

 82 4-5' N. Then it was found that the southerly drift of the ice 

 practically counterbalanced the progress made during the onward march 

 and the expedition was compelled to turn back. Before Dr. Hansen's 

 ever-memorable expedition, Parry's was the highest northing attained 

 in the Eastern Hemisphere. But it may be noted that the Austrian 

 Lieutenant Julius Payer, who, in conjunction with Lieutenant Carl 

 Weyprecht, discovered Franz Josef Land in 1873, reached in the fol- 

 lowing year the highest point on land yet attained in the Eastern 

 Hemisphere, in 82 05' 1ST. latitude. Neither Mr. Jackson, Mr. Well- 



