chap, xxi WIJDE BAY 



297 



The land is rapidly encroaching on the water, as at the head 

 of Dickson Bay. 



We saw no glacier emptying into the bay at its S\V. 

 extremity, though one is indicated on the chart. It may 

 have been hidden behind a corner. Pedersen said there 

 never was one here but a long green valley, far up which 

 he once went in pursuit of reindeer ; we had learned not 

 to put much confidence in his topographical memory. 

 The valley, whether containing a glacier or not, runs in 

 westward behind a fine sharp peak that stands out alone 

 and forms the most striking object in the view. South, at 

 the head of the bay, is a large mountain mass, to which I 

 have ventured to give the name Mount Sir Thomas. Wijde 

 Bay, like the greater part of the coasts and bays of Spits- 

 bergen, was first explored by English whalers. They named it 

 Sir Thomas Smith's Bay. 



The Dutch, following the English, called the place 

 Wijde Bay, and that name has stuck. It is a pity that 

 old designations should be thus obliterated. Sir Thomas's 

 name should, at all events, be preserved somewhere in the 

 neighbourhood. Most of the Norwegian, Swedish, and 

 German names that figure on our Admiralty Chart, and re- 

 ceive currency from it, usurp the position of the original 

 English or Dutch names. The substitution for Wiche 

 Land (so named by its discoverer, Thomas Edge) of the 

 modern designation King Carl Land is the most glaring 

 instance of this impiety. 



East and west of Mount Sir Thomas are passes by 

 which access might be attained to glaciers leading down 

 to the swamp at the head of Dickson Bay. The east pass 

 was reached from the south by Lieutenant Stjernspetz in 

 1883. Clouds prevented us from seeing it, and I was not 

 then informed of its existence, or I should certainly have 



