[179] Cf. The Three Voyages of William Barents, by Gerrit de Veer, 2nd Edition, with an Introduction by Lieutenant Koolemäns Beynen. London, 1876 (Works issued by the Hakluyt Society, No. 54).
[180] The sea in the neighbourhood of Spitzbergen on the east was on the other hand very open that year, so that it was possible for the same time to reach and circumnavigate the large island situated to the east of Spitzbergen, which had been seen in 1864 by Dunér and me from the top of White Mount in the interior of Stor Fjord.
[181] Nor does space permit me to give an account of various expeditions, which indeed concerned Novaya Zemlya, but did not penetrate farther eastward than their predecessors; for instance, the Rosenthal expedition of 1871, in which the well-known African traveller and Spitzbergen voyager Baron von Heuglin, and the Norwegian botanist Aage Aagaard, took part as naturalists; Payer and Weyprecht's voyage of reconnaissance in the sea between Spitzbergen and Novaya Zemlya in 1871, &c.
[182] Kongl. Svenska Vetenskaps-akademiens handlingar, 1869.
[183] At Mussel Bay, too, during the winter of 1872-73, the greatest degree of cold was the same; that is to say, at neither place did it reach the freezing-point of mercury. At the Vega's winter station, on the contrary, it was considerably greater.
[184] It is very common that the hunters in cases of importance and danger when it is difficult to settle what course ought to be taken, permit the drawing of lots to determine the choice.
[185] The statements made here regarding the wintering of Tobiesen and his companions are taken partly from a copy which I caused to be made of his journal, partly from an account of the adventures of the seven hunters, copied from Finmarksposten into Aftonbladet for 1873, No. 220. Finally, the account of the distribution of presents to the Samoyeds is copied from Norwegian journals into Aftonbladet for 1880, No. 197.
[186] The dates of the Ymer's voyage are as follows:—Left the coast of Norway on the 26th July; stay at Matotschkin Sound, through which I, on this occasion, steamed into the Kara Sea from the 30th July to the 5th August; arrival at the Yenisej on the 15th August; arrival at the anchorage at Goltschicha on the 16th August; commenced the return voyage on the 1st September, in the course of it passed Matotschkin Schar on the 7th September.
[187] Of Captain Wiggins' voyage I know only that his original destination was the Ob, but that on account of currents and shoals which, he encountered at the mouth of this river, he altered his plan, and reached the Yenisej in the beginning of September.
[188] Deutsche Geographische Blätter, Bremen, 1870, i. p. 216, and ii. p. 35.