The voyage from the Kara Sea to Port Dickson is not attended, according to recent experience, with any difficulty. Yet we cannot reckon on arriving at Port Dickson sooner than from the 10th to the 15th August. In 1875 I reached this harbour with a sailing-vessel on the 15th August, after having been much delayed by calms in the Kara Sea. With a steamer it would have been possible to have reached the harbour, that year, in the beginning of the month. In 1876 the state of the ice was less favourable, in consequence of a cold summer and a prevalence of north-east winds, but even then I arrived at the mouth of the Yenisej on the 15th August.
It is my intention to lie to at Port Dickson, at least for some hours, in order to deposit letters on one of the neighbouring islands in case, as is probable, I have no opportunity of meeting there some vessel sent out from Yeniseisk, by which accounts of the expedition may be sent home.
Actual observations regarding the hydrography of the coast between the mouth of the Yenisej and Cape Chelyuskin are for the present nearly wholly wanting, seeing that, as I have already stated, no large vessel has ever sailed from this neighbourhood. Even about the boat voyages of the Russians along the coast we know exceedingly little, and from their unsuccessful attempts to force a passage here we may by no means draw any unfavourable conclusion as to the navigability of the sea during certain seasons of the year. If, with a knowledge of the resources for the equipment of naval expeditions which Siberia now possesses, we seek to form an idea of the equipment of the Russian expeditions[7] sent out with extraordinary perseverance during the years 1734-1743 by different routes to the north coast of Siberia, the correctness of this assertion ought to be easily perceived. There is good reason to expect that a well-equipped steamer will be able to penetrate far beyond the point where they were compelled to return with their small but numerously manned craft, too fragile to encounter ice, and unsuitable for the open sea, being generally held together with willows.
There are, besides these, only three sea voyages, or perhaps more correctly coast journeys, known in this part of the Kara Sea, all under the leadership of the mates Minin and Sterlegoff. The first attempt was made in 1738 in a "double sloop," 70 feet long, 17 broad, and 7-1/2 deep, built at Tobolsk and transported thence to the Yenisej by Lieutenant Owzyn. With this vessel Minin penetrated off the Yenisej to 72°53' N.L. Hence a jolly boat was sent farther towards the north, but it too was compelled, by want of provisions, to return before the point named by me, Port Dickson, was reached. The following year a new attempt was made, without a greater distance being traversed than the summer before. Finally in the year 1740 the Russians succeeded in reaching, with the double sloop already mentioned, 75° 15' N. L., after having survived great dangers from a heavy sea at the river mouth. On the 2nd September, just as the most advantageous season for navigation in these waters had begun, they returned, principally on account of the lateness of the season.
There are, besides, two statements founded on actual observations regarding the state of the ice on this coast. For Middendorff, the Academician, during his famous journey of exploration in North Siberia, reached from land the sea coast at Tajmur Bay (75° 40' N.L.), and found the sea on the 25th August, 1843, free of ice as far as the eye could reach from the chain of heights along the coast.[8] Middendorff, besides, states that the Yakoot Fomin, the only person who had passed a winter at Tajmur Bay, declared that the ice loosens in the sea lying off it in the first half of August, and that it is driven away from the beach by southerly winds, yet not further than that the edge of the ice can be seen from the heights along the coast.
The land between the Tajmur and Cape Chelyuskin was mapped by means of sledge journeys along the coast by mate Chelyuskin in the year 1742. It is now completely established that the northernmost promontory of Asia was discovered by him in the month of May in the year already mentioned, and at that time the sea in its neighbourhood was of course covered with ice. We have no observation as to the state of the ice during summer or autumn in the sea lying immediately to the west of Cape Chelyuskin; but, as the question relates to the possibility of navigating this sea, this is the place to draw attention to the fact that Prontschischev, on the 1st September, 1736, in an open sea, with coasting craft from the east, very nearly reached the north point of Asia, which is supposed to be situated in 77° 34' N. Lat. and 105° E. Long., and that the Norwegian walrus-hunters during late autumn have repeatedly sailed far to the eastward from the north point of Novaya Zemlya (77° N. Lat., and 68° E. Long.), without meeting with any ice.
From what has been already stated, it is evident that for the present we do not possess any complete knowledge, founded on actual observations, of the hydrography of the stretch of coast between the Yenisej and Cape Chelyuskin. I, however, consider that during September, and possibly the latter half of August, we ought to be able to reckon with complete certainty on having here ice-free water, or at least a broad, open channel along the coast, from the enormous masses of warm water, which the rivers Obi, Irtisch, and Yenisej, running up through the steppes of High Asia, here pour into the ocean, after having received water from a river territory, everywhere strongly heated during the month of August, and more extensive than that of all the rivers put together, which fall into the Mediterranean and the Black Seas.
Between Port Dickson and White Island, there runs therefore a strong fresh-water current, at first in a northerly direction. The influence which the rotation of the earth exercises, in these high latitudes, on streams which run approximately in the direction of the meridian, is, however, very considerable, and gives to those coming from the south an easterly bend. In consequence of this, the river water of the Ohi and Yenisej must be confined as in a proper river channel, at first along the coast of the Tajmur country, until the current is allowed beyond Cape Chelyuskin to flow unhindered towards the north-east or east. Near the mouths of the large rivers I have, during calm weather in this current, in about 74° N.L., observed the temperature rising off the Yenisej to +9.4° C. (17th August, 1875), and off the Obi to +8°C. (10th August of the same year). As is usually the case, this current coming from the south produces both a cold undercurrent, which in stormy weather readily mixes with the surface water and cools it, and on the surface a northerly cold ice-bestrewn counter-current, which, in consequence of the earth's rotation, takes a bend to the west, and which evidently runs from the opening between Cape Chelyuskin and the northern extremity of Novaya Zemlya, towards the east side of this island, and perhaps may be the cause why the large masses of drift ice are pressed during summer against the east coast of Novaya Zemlya. According to my own experience and the uniform testimony of the walrus-hunters, this ice melts away almost completely during autumn.
In order to judge of the distance at which the current coming from the Obi and the Yenisej can drive away the drift ice, we ought to remember that even a very weak current exerts an influence on the position of the ice, and that, for instance, the current from the Plata River, whose volume of water, however, is not perhaps so great as that of the Obi and Yenisej, is still clearly perceptible at a distance of 1,500 kilometres from the river mouth, that is to say, about three times as far as from Port Dickson to Cape Chelyuskin. The only bay which can be compared to the Kara Sea in respect of the area, which is intersected by the rivers running into it, is the Gulf of Mexico.[9] The river currents from this bay appear to contribute greatly to the Gulf Stream.
The winds which, during the autumn months, often blow in these regions from the north-east, perhaps also, in some degree, contribute to keep a broad channel, along the coast in question, nearly ice-free.