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favourable for getting more to the north, for notwithftanding 

 Mr. Breet met with fo much ice, from the latitude of 79 deg. 

 30 min. to that of 80 deg. 58 min. Captain Jan Klaas Caftricum, 

 in the fhip the Jonge Jan, at that very time of the year, and 

 nearly in the fame longitude, reached 81 deg. 40 min. by the 

 medium of feveral obfervations with foreftaffs, where he fiftied 

 with fuccefs in company with Witje Jelles, who failed from 

 Hamburg, and found but little ice. There were likewife two 

 Englifh ftiips, who failed fo far to the north, that Caftricum loft 

 fight of them from the maft head, which two fhips returned in 

 fomething more than two days, and the Captains came on board 

 of Caftricum d , and allured him that they had been to up-* 

 wards of 83 degrees, and could have gone much further, as they 

 had no obftruclions from ice, but finding no whales, they re- 

 turned. I fpoke at the fame time with other commanders, who, 

 having been in fight of thofe fhips, confirmed Caftricum's ac- 

 count. 



Six of the oldeft mafters affured me (amongft whom were 

 John Walig, Klaas Keuken, and J. Klaas Caftricum) that they 

 had known from 1730 to 1742 an old Englifh commander, 

 whofe name was Krickrack e ; it was his cuftom between the 

 flfheries, if not obftrucled by ice, to fail to the northward, 

 and fome of them affirm, that when they have been at an an- 

 chor in Brandewyn's-Bay, he once ftayed away ten, and at 

 another time twenty days, before his return, and they are very 

 fure that he reported (and they have reafons to believe him) that 



d Captain Caftricum neither afked their names, nor thofe of their 

 fhips; all that he knew was, he faid if he remembered right, they failed 

 from England. 



e From 1730 to 1740, moft of the mafters of Englifh fhips, feted out 

 for the Greenland trade, were Dutchmen. 



lie 



