ARCTIC VOYAGES OF DISCOVERY. 341 



amongst our friends, it comforted us well as if we had made a great banquet 

 in our owne house. And we also made trinkets, and our gunner was king of 

 Novaya Zemlya, which is at least 800 miles long and lyeth between two seas." 



On January 24 the edge of the sun appeared above the horizon, and the 

 sight was a joyful one indeed. Now also the furious snow-storm ceased, and 

 though the severity of the cold continued unabated, they were better able to 

 brave the outer air and to recruit their strength by exercise. With the re- 

 turn of daylight the bears came again about the house, and some being shot, af- 

 forded a very seasonable supply of grease, so that they were able to burn lamps 

 and pass the time in reading. 



When summer returned it was found impossible to disengage the ice-bound 

 vessel, and the only hopes of escaping from this dreary prison now rested on 

 two small boats, in which they finally quitted the scene of so much suffering 

 on June 14, 1596,, On the fourth day of their voyage their barks became 

 surrounded by enormous masses of floating ice, which so crushed and injured 

 them that the crews, giving up all hope, took a solemn leave of each other. 

 But in this desperate crisis they owed their preservation to the presence of 

 mind and agility of De Veer, who, with a well-secured rope, leaped from one 

 ice-block to another till he reached a larger floe, on which first the sick, then 

 the stores, the crews, and finally the boats themselves were fairly landed. Here 

 they were obliged to remain while the boats underwent the necessary repairs, 

 and during this detention upon a floating ice raft/the gallant Barentz closed the 

 eventful voyage of his life. He died as he had lived, calmly and bravely, think- 

 ing less of himself than of the welfare of his fellow-sufferers, for his last words 

 were directions as to the course in which they were to steer. His death was 

 bitterly mourned by the rough men under his command, and even the prospect 

 of a return to their homes could not console them for the loss of their beloved 

 leader. After a most tedious passage (for by July 28 they had only reached 

 the southern extremity of Nova Zembla) they at length, at the end of August, 

 arrived at Kola, in Russian Lapland, where, to their glad surprise, they found 

 their old comrade, John Cornelison Ryp,- with whom they returned to Am- 

 sterdam. 



Meanwhile the spirit of discovery had once more recovered in England from 

 the chill thrown upon it by so many previous disappointments. In 1602, Wey- 

 mouth, while attempting to sail up the promising inlet, now so well-known as 

 the entrance to Hudson's Bay, was repulsed by a violent storm, arid in 1606 a 

 melancholy issue awaited the next expedition to the north-west, which sailed 

 under the command of John Knight, a brave and experienced sailor. Driven 

 by stormy weather among the drift-ice on the coast of Labrador, Knight was 

 fain to take shelter in the first cove that presented itself, and lost no time in or- 

 dering his damaged ship of forty tons to be drawn high up on the dry sand be- 

 yond the tide mark, where she might undergo the necessary repairs. 



This position, however, not proving satisfactory, he manned his boat next 

 day, and while the rest of the crew were busy at work, sailed across to the 

 other side of the inlet to seek for some more convenient anchorage. Leaing 

 two men in charge of the boat, he landed with his mate and three of his men to 



