i2 SPITSBERGEN chap, i 



Cape Platen round to Cape Mohn. We landed at the Seven 

 Islands and closely approached Wiches Land (King Carl's 

 Land). We brought back about 600 photographs of all parts 

 of Spitsbergen. Such were our topographical results. The 

 scientific results were more important, and will be duly 

 chronicled hereafter. Our collections are in the National 

 Museums at South Kensington and Kew, where they fill 

 certain gaps — notably in the case of the geological collec- 

 tion. 



We could have done more surveying had the weather 

 been less persistently foggy. You cannot survey what you 

 cannot see. With better sledges we might have covered 

 more ground. As it was, we accomplished all that, I believe, 

 would have been possible for any one to accomplish in the 

 time and with the means at our disposal. I look back 

 upon the season as one fruitfully and upon the whole 

 pleasantly spent. The fogs condoned their sins against the 

 plane-table with entrancing charms for the eye. The bogs 

 are not miserable to memory. Sometimes the sun shone 

 for clays and nights together upon landscapes woven of 

 sunlight and silver. Of such tapestries how can one's 

 memory be dispossessed ? Even had we accomplished no 

 exploration nor added aught to scientific knowledge, the 

 journey would have been worth while for the mere pleasure 

 of it. That we may share this pleasure with a wider circle 

 is the modest reason for the publication of the following 

 narrative. 



