1 882.] Geography and Travels. 859 



Bay and wait till a more favorable opportunity should present 

 itself to proceed. On August 7 the Eira was made fast to the 

 land floe near Bell Island, and a store house was erected of mate- 

 rials taken out of the Eira. On August 15 the Eira left Bell 

 Island and being unable to pass to the eastwards of Barents Hook, 

 she was made fast to the land floe off Cape Flora. The next few 

 days were spent in collecting plants and fossils, which unfortu- 

 nately were lost with the vessel. On August 21 the Eira was 

 heavily nipped by the ice, and about 10 a. m. a leak was discov- 

 ered. The Eira sank in two hours time, before many stores were 

 saved. A house was built on Cape Flora of stones and turf, and 

 covered with sails, and the winter was spent there. The party 

 depended chiefly for food on the bears and walrus. Thirty-six 

 bears and twenty-nine walrus were killed and eaten. Large num- 

 bers of walrus appearing in June, they were enabled to lay in pro- 

 visions for two months and started in four boats on June 21, 1882, 

 for Novaya Zemlya. Eighty miles of water was encountered be- 

 fore reaching ice. Then the troubles began, and six weeks of 

 constant toil followed until the open water was again found, and 

 within twenty-four hours of leaving the ice the four boats, with 

 their crews of twenty-five in all, were safely landed upon the 

 beach at Matyushin 'Strait on the evening of August 2, where 

 they were found the next day, first by the' Dutch expedition in 

 the Wilkm Barents, and then by the Hope. The Hope arrived 

 at Peterhead on August 20, within a few hours of the anniversary 

 of the day when the Eira was lost. 



There seems now no reason to doubt that at some period of 

 every summer, Franz-Josef Land is accessible without great diffi- 

 culty, and it undoubtedly presents, at present, the most inviting 

 and encouraging field for Arctic exploration for the purpose of 

 reaching the most northern latitudes. 



Arctic Exploration. — Lieutenant Hovgaard, formerly of the 

 Nordenskiold Expedition, will sail early in June, from Copen- 

 hagen, in the steamer Dympna for Cape Chelyuskin, afterwards 

 endeavoring to reach Franz-Josef Land. 



Remains of Northmen have been found on the east coast of 

 Greenland in lat. 6o° 31' N. The building discovered is forty 

 paces long by ten wide, and its foundations consist partly of 

 stones of cyclopean dimensions. There are similar ruins, the na- 

 tives report, in lat. 6o° N. 



Immense ice-floes filled the sea between Spitzbergen and Ice- 

 land in June. In Iceland large districts are said to be suffering 

 from famine, as the vessels are unable to land the provisions on 

 the customary arrival of which the}- depended. The severity of 

 the weather is preventing the growth of the crops, and large 

 numbers of sheep and ponies are dying. 



( Baron Nordenskiold has published the first volume of the 

 " Scientific Results of the Vega Expedition." It covers 800 pages 



