3 o2 SPITSBERGEN chap, xxn 



Knottie Point, but this original name, like most of the 

 other English names, has been wiped off the chart. 



Keeping far out, to avoid certain sunken rocks, till we 

 had come opposite South Gat, we ran for Magdalena Bay. 

 Its fame is indeed well deserved. The snow-fairies possess 

 few lovelier retreats in all the glacier regions of the world. 

 There was no time to spare, for the swift south gale was 

 bringing up a storm of snow which came with the en- 

 veloping clouds, and was about to overflow the hills into 

 the bay. The heaving sea, the dashing water, the tumbling 

 boat, the noisy wind, the low-racing clouds, tearing down 

 over the hills like some tidal wave breaking on a rock-bound 

 coast, formed a combination of circumstances which gave 

 to the view of Magdalena Bay a setting of excitement. There 

 was a vision of purest glaciers, tumbling between jagged 

 and jutting ridges of aiguilles, seamed by steep couloirs, a 

 vision of glaciers with wide blue-fronted snouts washed by 

 the blue sea, a radiating series of ice-rivers and cataracts 

 stretching back on all sides into the icy interior. The 

 buttress aretes were like so many Peteret ridges, powdered 

 with fresh snow on such little ledges as would retain it. A 

 moment only we beheld these things ; the curtain descended, 

 and they were gone. 



Round went the helm once more, and back we plunged 

 into the open sea, now white with foam-caps, which the 

 wind caught up and drove along through the air. The 

 Seven Icebergs and all the features of the coast were lost 

 in fog, and a painful time we had of it for the next few 

 hours till Mitra Cape was passed. Here Kings and Cross 

 Bays open from a common mouth, and we bent in to see 

 them. Cross Bay is a deep and gloomy retreat, now seldom 

 visited, but once haunted by whales and their captors. Hills 

 rise steeply on either side, and seem to multiply in the dis- 

 tance, where the end splits into three small divisions. Hill- 



