8 



Midmorning by the Ice 



(Dutch) 



CAPTAIN PETER VETTEWINKEL had always accepted it as 

 a God-given certainty that nobody born outside of Amsterdam, 

 or at least outside the Kingdom of Orange, could be capable of doing 

 anything efficiently. And with this absolute assumption it was frankly 

 very hard to take issue when on a ship riding at anchor off the settle- 

 ment of Smeerenburg, or Blubbertown, as the English called it, in 

 Spitsbergen in the year 1625. In this desolate and otherwise quite use- 

 less spot something that could well be described as a thriving port 

 producing almost pure profit had grown up solely through the in- 

 genuity, foresight, and industry of people born in the particular area 

 in western Europe specified, and under the direction of persons 

 from his own home port of Amsterdam. This, of course, the gallant 

 captain deemed wholly appropriate. 



On the gently sloping shoulder of a gently curving bay, deep in 

 a sound protected from all possible winds, and hard by a deep-water 

 anchorage with firm sand bottom, Smeerenburg's low huts, ware- 

 houses, shops, camps, and dormitories nestled in neat rows and obvi- 



