306 
THEORIES OF AN OPEN SEA. 
I need not give. But I am reluctant to close my notice 
of this discover}^ of an open sea, without adding that 
the details of Mr. Morton’s narrative harmonized with 
the observations of all our party. I do not propose to 
discuss here the causes or conditions of this pheno¬ 
menon. How far it may extend,—whether it exists 
simply as a feature of the immediate region, or as part 
of a great and unexplored area communicating with a 
Polar basin,—and what may be the argument in favor 
of one or the other hypothesis, or the explanation 
which reconciles it with established laws,—may be 
questions for men skilled in scientific deductions. Mine 
has been the more humble duty of recording what we 
saw. Coming as it did, a mysterious fiuiditv in the 
midst of vast plains of solid ice, it was well calculated 
to arouse emotions of the highest order; and I do not 
believe thei’e was a man among us who did not lon^ for 
the means of embarking upon its bright and lonely 
waters. But he who may be content to follow our 
story for the next few months will feel, as we did, 
that a controlling necessity made the desire a fruitless 
one. 
An open sea near the Pole, or even an open Polar 
basin, has been a topic of theory for a long time, and 
has been shadowed forth to some extent by actual or 
supposed discoveries. As far back as the days of 
Barentz, in 1596, without referring to the earlier and 
more uncertain chronicles, water was seen to the east¬ 
ward of the northernmost cape of Novaia Zemlia; and, 
until its limited extent was defined by direct observa- 
