34 Geography, [Chap. V, 



without success; excepting that each succeeding 

 attempt rendered the practicability, aild especially 

 the safet}^ of such a passage, still more improbable. 

 In 1773 captain Phipps, since lord Mulgrave, was 

 dispatched, under the patronage of the British 

 governmt?nt, toward the North Pole, on a voyage 

 of discovery. He proceeded as far as the 80th de- 

 gree of nortli latitude, where the mountains of ice 

 presentdd invincible opposition to his further pro- 

 gress. Although the expedition of Phipps con- 

 fu-med the accounts. given by the Russians, Dutch, 

 and others, of the impracticability of a passage to 

 the east, through those seas ; and although it con- 

 siderably increased our acquaintance with that part 

 of the globe, not a k^w believe that such a passage 

 really exists, and that it may yet be found. 



But of all the circumnavigators and geographical 

 discoverers who have distinguished the eighteenth 

 centur^^, captain James Cook* ought undoubt- 

 jedly to be viewed as the most illustrious, whether 

 we consider the extent or the usefulness of his 

 enterprises. His three voyages, undertaken by or- 

 der, and at the expense of the British govern- 

 ment, and performed between the years 1768 and 

 1779, were productive of a vast fund of know- 

 ledge, equally interesting and valuable, concern- 

 ing the various parts of the world which he vi- 

 sited. He collected important original informa- 

 tion, respecting islands and coasts long before dis- 

 covered, and supposed to be well known. He 

 discovered man\' others which bad never been be- 



* Capt. James Cook was born in Yorkshire, in tlie year 1728^ 

 and \va.s killed at Owliyhcc, February 14, 1/79. 



