Preliminarij Chapter. 



XXXV 



to the gain to commerce, to science, or to navsil impulse Ijy i^ii*rlaiid's 

 work for tlie Northwest Passage and the Relief expeditions, he sa3s: 



Tliis doubtless has been very great; to wluiliiig coinmercc it has oiicucd up 

 all to the north and west of Davis Strait and Hudson Strait ; also to the nortli 

 of Behring's Strait. The value of these fisheries alone amounts to xcry iininy 

 millions sterling into the pockets of English and American traders. The scien- 

 tific results are very varied and ample in almost every department, and ])eculiarly 

 so in magnetism, meteorology, the tides, geographical discoveries, geology, botany, 

 and zoology, as shown by the general advance in each branch. Upon na\al im- 

 pulse the influence has been tridy great; we conld man an expedition witli Ku- 

 giish naval officers ; and abroad we have seen Germans, Austrians, Swedes, Nor- 

 wegians, and this year Dutchmen, induced to take part in the work of Arctic 

 exploration. 



The problem of the Northwest Passage is no longer one of prac- 

 tical utility. Science has ceased to expect from its discovery the ad- 

 vantages for commerce and navigation the hope of which stimulated 

 the explorers. The northeast passage around Asia, successfully prose- 

 cuted in the years 1878-79, by Professor Nordenskiold, promises large 

 rewards in the interests of science and of commerce. The cereals, the 

 graphite, ivory, and other products of the Asiatic Arctic seaboard are 

 akeady coming into the European markets. Lieutenant Payer, of the 

 German North Polar Expedition of 1869, has justly said of the whole 

 Polar question that "as a problem of science it aims at determining 

 limits of land and water, at perfecting that network of lines with wliich 

 comparative science seeks to surround our planet even to the Pole, the 

 discovery of the physical laws which regulate climates, the currents of 

 the atmosphere and the sea, and the analogies of geology with the earth 

 as we see it." 



