Still, the discovery of a country, like any other discovery or invention in science or the arts, dates properly from the time when the knowledge of that discovery is first recorded and publicly communicated to the civilised world; and in this sense even the Russian admiral Lütke,[11] the great explorer of Novaya Zemlya in modern times, does not hesitate to acknowledge, that, owing to the absence of all written records bearing on the subject, his countrymen cannot pretend to lay claim to the “discovery” of Novaya Zemlya.
Richard Chancellor, pilot-major of Willoughby’s fleet, was far more fortunate than his hapless chief. In the third vessel, the Edward Bonaventure, commanded by Stephen Burrough, he succeeded in entering the Bay of St. Nicholas, since better known as the White Sea, and on the 24th of August, 1553, reached in safety the western mouth of the river Dwina, whence he proceeded overland to the court of the Emperor of Muscovy or Russia, at Moscow. The result was the foundation of the commercial and political relations [[lxviii]]between England and Russia, which have subsisted, with but brief interruptions, till the present day.
Shortly after Chancellor had brought his section of Willoughby’s expedition to so successful an issue, the company of merchant-adventurers, by whom the three ships had been fitted out, received a charter of incorporation, bearing date February 6th, 1 and 2 Ph. and Mar. (1554–5); and subsequently, in the eighth year of Queen Elizabeth (1566), they obtained an Act of Parliament, in which they are styled “the Fellowship of English Merchants for Discovery of New Trades”; a title under which they still continue incorporated, though they are better known by the designation of the “Muscovy” or “Russia Company”.
It is not here the place to discuss the general proceedings of the Russia Company, important though they be, and highly deserving of being made the subject of special investigation. All that we have to do is to notice the expeditions which were undertaken under the auspices of that company, for the purpose of exploring the seas bounding the Russian Empire on the north, with a view to the discovery of a north-east passage to China.
Of these expeditions, the first was that of Stephen Burrough, who had in 1553 been the master of Richard Chancellor’s ship, the Edward Bonaventure, and who now, in 1556, was despatched in the pinnace Searchthrift to make discovery towards the river Ob.[12]
Leaving Gravesend on the 23rd of April of the latter year, Burrough, on the 23rd of May, passed the North Cape, which he had so named on his first voyage, and on the 9th of June reached Kola, where he fell in with several small Russian vessels (lodji), all “bound to Pechora, a fishing for salmons and morses”.[13] The master of one of these boats, named Gabriel, rendered good service to Burrough, who is [[lxix]]diffuse in his praise of Gabriel’s conduct, as contrasted with that of other Russian seamen with whom he had to do.
In the company of these native boats Burrough passed by Svyátoi Nos, called by him Cape St. John; Kanin Nos (Caninoz); the island of Kolguev, by mistake called in his journal Dolgoieue; then the second Svyátoi Nos, and so to “the dangerous barre of Pechora”. Passing still onwards, he, on St. James’s day, July 25th, “spied certain islands”, lying to the south of Novaya Zemlya, under one of which he anchored, naming it “St. James his Island”,[14] and making its latitude to be 70° 42′ N., which according to Lütke[15] is about 10′ too far north. The next day they “plyed to the westwards alongst the shoare” of the southern extremity of Novaya Zemlya, where they met with another small native vessel, the master of which, named Loshak, told them that they were past the way which should bring them to the Ob;—that the land by which they were was “called Noua Zembla, that is to say, the New Land;”—and that “in this Noua Zembla is the highest mountaine in the worlde, as he thought, and that Camen Bolshay,[16] which is on the maine of Pechora, is not to be compared to this mountaine; but” (adds Burrough cautiously) “I saw it not”.[17]
On the 31st of July, Burrough was “at an anker among the islands of Vaigats”; on one of which islands he went on shore the following day. On Monday, the 3rd of August, he continues: “We weyed and went roome with another island, which was five leagues east-north-east from us; and there I met againe with Loshak, and went on shore with him, and hee brought me to a heap of the Samoeds idols, which were in number aboue 300, the worst and the most unartificiall worke that ever I saw. The eyes and mouthes of sundrie of them were bloodie; they had the shape of men, [[lxx]]women, and children, very grosly wrought; and that which they had made for other parts was also sprinckled with blood. Some of their idols were an olde sticke, with two or three notches made with a knife in it. I saw much of the footing of the sayd Samoeds, and of the sleds that they ride in.”[18]
These particulars clearly prove that the spot thus described by Burrough is Bolvánovsky Nos (Image Cape), at the north-eastern extremity of the island of Vaigats, in 70° 29′ N. lat., which place, according to Lütke,[19] was visited by Ivanov in 1824, and found to be in precisely the same state as represented by its English discoverer. There is a second cape of the same name at the south-eastern extremity of Vaigats Island, in 69° 40′ N. lat., which is the Afgodenhoeck (Idol Cape) of Linschoten and the Beeldthoeck (Image Cape) of De Veer, and which is described by the latter in his account of their second voyage, at pages 53 and 60 of the present volume. Lütke[20] erroneously identifies this latter cape with the one discovered by Burrough; but this is evidently a mere oversight, as the two capes of the same name are distinctly laid down in his chart.
On the 5th of August, fearing to be hemmed in by the ice, which approached his ship in immense masses, Burrough returned westwards, and then southwards; and on the 22nd of the same month, on account of the north and north-easterly winds, the great quantity of ice, and the advanced season of the year, he determined on not attempting to proceed further to the east, but returned round Kanin Nos into the White Sea, and so to Kholmogorui (Colmogro), the Russian port on the Dwina previously to the foundation of Archangelsk,—Archangel, or Novo-Kholmogorui, as it was at first called,—where he arrived on the 11th of September.[21]