138 



THE POLAR WORLD. 



lately by Mr. Blomstrand in King's Bay, and similar strata exist in various parts 

 of Bell Sound and Ice Sound. Large quantities of drift-wood, probably from 

 the large Siberian rivers, are deposited by the currents, particularly on the 

 north coasts of North-east Land, and on the southern coasts of Stans Fore- 

 land. In English Bay Lord Dufferin saw innumerable logs of unhewn tim- 

 ber, mingled with which lay pieces of broken spars, an oar, a boat's flagstaff, 

 and a few shattered fragments of some long-lost vessel's planking. 



Most probably the Norwegians had their attention directed at a very early 

 period to the existence of a land lying to the north of Finmarken by the troops 

 of migratory birds which they saw flying northward in spring, and by the 

 casual visits of sea-bears, which the drift-ice carried to the south. There can 

 be no doubt that they were the first discoverers of Spitzbergen, but their his- 

 tory contains no positive records of the fact, and it was not before the sixteenth 

 century that Europe first became acquainted with that desolate archipelago. 

 Sir Hugh Willoughby may possibly have seen it in 1559, but it is certain that 

 on June 19, 1596, Barentz, Heemsk'erke,.and Ryp, who had sailed in two ships 

 from Amsterdam to discover the north-eastern passage to India, landed on its 

 western coast, and gave it the name it bears to the present day. In the year 

 1607 it was visited by the unfortunate Henry Hudson, and four years later the 

 first English whalers were fitted out by the Russia Company in London to fish 

 in the bays of Spitzbergen, or East Greenland, as it was at that time called, 

 being supposed to be the eastern prolongation of that vast island. Here our 

 countrymen met with Dutchmen, Norwegians, and Biscayans from Bayonne 

 and the ports of Northern Spain, and commercial rivalry soon led to the usual 

 quarrels. In the year 1613 James L granted the Russia Company a patent, 

 giving them the exclusive right to fish in the Spitzbergen waters, and seven 

 ships of war were sent out to enforce their pretensions. The Dutch, the Nor- 

 wegians, and the Biscayans were driven away; a cross with the name of the 

 King of England was erected on the shore, and Spitzbergen received the name 

 of " King James his Newland." This triumph, however, was but of short du- 

 ration, and after a struggle, in which none of the combatants gained any decis- 

 ive advantage, all parties came at last to an amicable agreement. The English 

 received for their share the best stations on the south-western coast, along with 

 English Bay and Magdalena Bay. The Dutch were obliged to retreat to the 

 north, and chose Amsterdam Island, with Smeerenbe^g Bay, as the seat of their 

 operations. The Danes or Norwegians established their head-quarters on 

 Dane's Island ; the Hamburgers, who also came in for their share, in Ham- 

 burg Bay ; and the French or Biscayans on the north coast, in Red Bay. At 

 present a right or smooth-backed whale rarely shows itself in the Spitzbergen 

 waters, but at that time it was so abundant that frequently no less than forty 

 whalers used to anchor in a single bay, and send out their boats to kill these 

 cetaceans, who came there for the purpose of casting their young in the shel- 

 tered friths and channels. The fat of the captured whales was immediately 

 boiled in large kettles on the shore, and the bays of Spitzbergen presented a 

 most animated spectacle during the summer season. 



Numerous coffins — an underground burial being impossible in this frost* 



