CHAPTER Ш. 
The Geographical Survey. 
Introductory Remarks. Instruments. 
In a cursory, forced survey of an unknown stretch of land, one 
must start by understanding that every direct connection by sights 
from the one station to the preceding or succeeding one is going to 
fail. It must thus as a matter of fact be possible to map out every 
single station independently of the others, i. e. at every single station 
one ought to perform the necessary astronomical observations for 
the determination of longitude, latitude and azimuth. 
On the other hand one ought, to the fullest extent of one’s 
powers, to aim at establishing a connection between the stations, by 
means of terrestrial observations; the more successful the connection 
of this kind is, i. e. the more the connection between the stations 
assumes the character of a triangulation net, the more solid will be 
the framework constituting the basis of the whole survey. 
One condition necessary in order to obtain a direct connection 
between the stations is ample time, so that one may stop in every 
place where a halt is necessary, out of regard to the connection, 
and there to perform the necessary ascents of mountains, in order 
to get a general view of the surroundings. During forced sledge 
trips, however, one never has sufficient time, and one only stops, 
when one’s strength is spent, and arduous ascents of mountains are 
almost invariably out of the question. One is forced to choose one’s 
station in places of no special prominence on the sea-ice or in the 
immediate neighbourhood of the coast, and the connection between 
the stations must, as a rule. be restricted to the pointing from each 
station of a few prominent peaks that become visible during a period 
of travel covering several days, and which thus in a way become 
the fixed points of the framework. Under these conditions one must 
pay particular attention to the astronomical determinations to avoid 
running the risk of the map becoming a more or less arbitrary 
mosaic of fragments, and not a connected whole. 
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