386 I. I. Hayes on the Passage to the North Pole. 
historian, in his valuable work upon “The Arctic Regions” thus | 
speaks of them. ‘All beyond the 84th parallel are given with | 
very loose authority, such as the vague reports of the Dutch 
whale-fishers, and in no case from the direct communication of 
the voyagers themselves, As such there is no reliance whatever 
to be placed in these very extraordinary reports. Of the remain- 
der, although said to have been given from celestial observation, 
in reality they are reported from memory. But with regard 
to those accounts communicated by the voyagers themselves, we 
find above one-half were from oral testimony, at the distance of 
eighteen or thirty years from the time.” Dr. Kane, after a care- 
ful examination of their conflicting statements, was satisfied that 
they were wholly worthless, as data upon which to found an hy- 
pothesis; and in a paper.read before the American Geographic 
and Statistical Society, December, 1852, said, that “after discard- 
ing the apocryphal voyages of the early Dutch, whose imper- 
fect nautical observations rendered wholly unreliable their asser- 
tions of latitudes, we have the names of but two who may be 
said to have attained the parallel of 82°, Hendrick Hudson in 
d Edward Parry in our own times.” Barrow attached 
ages to the Arctic Regions,” he asserted his belief “that it was 
not merely a matter of opinion that several ships had at oe 
times been carried three or four degrees beyond Spitzbergen an 
h 7 
While these evidences should be accepted with caution re 
irresponsible persons. The reports come from men W 
true had no theories to maintain, and might therefore be 
d to the Aretic 
t ent farthest 
with government expeditions, all of which failed with the sing, 
as ‘ Hudson 18 _ ; 
to have reached this parallel, but I must express a doubt ie + 
went beyond 81°. Boole reached only to 79° 50’. | Foie . 
after repeated efforts, did not get beyond 80°, nor did eet 
fatigable but unfortunate Barutz or his companion Come'™ 
