chap, xix AT ADVENT POINT 261 



inventor of Spitsbergen as a tourist resort. This year, as 

 already mentioned, her passengers had had the rare good 

 luck to be carried to lat. 8i° 40', without the smallest risk 

 or discomfort. They waited some time at Danes Island, 

 hoping to see Andree go up, and they visited Liefde Bay. 

 They were now to spend three days in Ice Fjord, and then 

 go south to see the eclipse of the sun from Vadso. Of course 

 the shore at once became animated with clean and well- 

 dressed people, one of whom came to call, bringing an 

 introduction to Gregory. We entertained him to an ill- 

 cooked feast, I fear. I visited Captain Bade, and heard from 

 his lips the thrilling tale of his experiences on the German 

 Arctic expedition of 1869-70. The ship to which he be- 

 longed was crushed in the ice off Greenland, and the crew 

 took to an ice-floe and lived for 237 clays on it, drifting 

 down the coast. They built a hut on the floe, but the 

 ice broke across beneath it, so that they lost a great part 

 of their provisions and other supplies. They were reduced 

 to direst extremities and shortest of short commons. At 

 last they were able to take to their boats ; they rowed round 

 Cape Farewell, found a Danish ship, and were brought by 

 her to Copenhagen, arriving in Europe the very day that 

 news was received of the battle of Sedan. 



Captain Bade was full of interest in our doings and of 

 advice for the future. He blew rather cold on our plans, 

 and prophesied that the ice would now come rapidly down 

 on the north coast, and that we should find it difficult to 

 reach the Seven Islands. The best time had passed. A 

 strong north wind was blowing, and we must be infinitely 

 cautious. " When the ice comes," he said, " it comes with an 

 incredible speed. Remember, on our ice-floe off Greenland, 

 we once drifted through two degrees of latitude in twenty- 

 four hours. The sea is clear to-day, to-morrow it is all ice. 

 Don't venture in an iron boat down Hinloopen Strait. 



