Notes on the exploration of the Arctic American Archipelago 
and its natural conditions. 
The first botanical information we i)ossess about any part of the Archipelago 
dates from 1818, and in fact all the lands lying north of Hudson Strait and west 
of Baffin's Bay were up to that time practieally unknown in every respect. Indeed 
Sebastian Ca bot in his journey 1498 may have sighted the coast of Baffin Land 
and Frobisher in 1576 even effected a landing in the same island which he took 
to be Greenland, hut no information of any value resulted from these voyages, even 
Da VIS did not visit the western shore which he saw in 1588 as far north as Cape 
Dyer, beyond the Arctic Circle, and niostly the explorers of old times were seeking 
for a Northwest Passage and kept to the coast of the mainland. Thus Hudson in 
1611 found the strait now bearing his name and, sailing through it, saw as well the 
southern shore of what is now called Baffin Land as also some smaller Islands to 
the soutli and west, and several others tried the same route, but only one expedi- 
tion went to the north, viz., that of Baffin in 1616 which reached 77<'45'N. in 
Smith Sound and not only extended the exploration of the Greenland coast far 
beyond the northernmost points of former voyages but also discovered North Devon 
and the northernmost of all the large islands of the Archipelago, EUesmere Land. 
Now tiie discoveries in the American part of the Polar Sea came to a standstill, 
the attention being directed to other quarters, and but for some whaling vessels 
nobody visited Baftin's Bay for two hundred years. 
In 1818, however, the English government sent out an expedition under the 
command of John Rosa to control the halfforgotten discoveries of Baffin and make 
a renewed search for a passage to the west. Now, indeed, this expedition w^as a 
failure as far as geographical discoveries are concerned, but in other respects it 
brought home much interesting information, and among other things also the first 
small botanical collection ever made in the American Archipelago. It is to be 
regretted, however, that the collectors, Captain Ross himself, Captain Sabine, and 
Dr. FisHEB, or perhaps more probably the editor of the plantlist in Ross' narrative. 
Rob. Beown, did not mention any special Iccalities for each separate species, but 
have thrown together all plants from Danish Greenland, the neighbourhood of Cape 
