ch. xxx vi] The North-East Passage 
325 
race which they had been able to make during the long 
detention in winter quarters. The two divisions of coast 
and reindeer Tchuktchis numbered 3000. The former daily 
visited the Vega during the winter, in parties numbering 
from ten to twenty, were allowed to go where they liked, 
and never attempted to steal anything. Palander found 
them good-natured, friendly, hospitable, and honest. 
Nordenskiold's activities did not cease with this, the 
greatest of his achievements. He made a second journey 
over the inland ice of Greenland, effected a landing 
on the east coast, and encouraged the aspirations of 
young men such as Bj orling and Kallstenius, whose 
melancholy fate was a cause of sorrow to him 1 . After 
he was ennobled Nordenskiold lived chiefly at his beautiful 
country seat of Dalbyo, where I twice visited him. His 
latest labours, in bringing to light and publishing medieval 
maps and charts and portolans in two splendid volumes, 
were not the least important. His researches and dis- 
coveries threw much new light on the history of 
cartography. When he died a vast amount of knowledge 
died with him, and there passed away from among us an 
illustrious man of science, a great explorer, a great 
geographer, and a man of whom his countrymen may well 
be proud 2 . 
While Nordenskiold was engaged in his Siberian 
labours, there was an enthusiastic English master mariner 
who was also filled with the idea of opening a trade with 
Russia by the Arctic Sea. Joseph Wiggins was born in 
1832 at Norwich, between which place and London his 
father drove the "Nelson" coach three times a week, until 
railroads superseded coaches. At fourteen Joseph went to 
1 In 1892 these two young Swedish enthusiasts started with the object 
of exploring the part of Ellcsmere Island between Jones and Smith Sounds. 
They bought a small cutter of 37 tons at St John's, Newfoundland, and 
went up Baffin's Bay to the Cary Islands. In 1893 a whaler found her 
driven on shore at one of the Cary Islands and full of ice. There was a 
record written by Bjorling asking that, if nothing was heard of them 
in 1893, relief might be sent to Clarence Point on Ellesmere Island. They 
went away in an open boat. I appealed for funds and collected £100 as a 
help to Nordenskiold's fund for sending a steamer. She went, but nothing 
more was ever found or heard of these gallant youths. 
- Both his sons inherited much of the ability of their father. The 
eldest died young, but not before he had done valuable ethnographic 
work. The younger, Erland, now Baron Nordenskiold, has made two 
journeys among the Amazonian Indians, with excellent ethnographic 
and linguistic results. 
