CHAPTER I
Early adventurers: Pytheas.—Dicuil.—Other.—Wulfstan.—The Norsemen.—Iva Bardsen.—The Cabots.—The Cortereals.—Willoughby and Chancellor.—Stephen Burrough.—Niccolò Zeno.—Frobisher.—Pet and Jackman.—Sir Humphrey Gilbert.—Davis.—Barentz.
A grave old world, majestically swinging upon its axis, the mystery of its northern extremity locked closely within its breast, is suddenly electrified by the news that at last man, for centuries baffled in his heroic efforts, has revealed its hidden secret, and that Old Glory, symbol of the daring of the moderns, floats from the Pole itself.
What a thrill of interest passes over the nations of the earth; universal excitement; universal rejoicings. Cablegram, Marconigram, carry the wonderful tidings under the seas or around the world in space.
The Pole at last! For ages the northern lights have beckoned the adventurous spirits to fathom the phenomena of the great unknown, have lured man into harbours fantastic with the frozen ice of centuries, have inspired him to cross the Greenland ice cap—or make his lonely trail through the “barrens” of North America or the desolate “tundra” of Siberia, his dauntless courage unquenched by previous records of privation, starvation, and death itself. One after another of intrepid explorers have left their stories of thrilling adventure, and record of their names or those of their benefactors to mark their personal discoveries.
What a history, what suffering, what sacrifice, compensated by great achievement, by heroism, by glory—by the additions to the world’s record of scientific knowledge!
Who were the early mariners that aspired to penetrate the unknown seas of ice? Far back in the centuries, Pytheas, bold adventurer, brought back rumours of an island in the Arctic Circle called Thule, at first welcomed by the ancients as a wonderful discovery, but afterwards discredited. In the ninth century some Irish monks, carried away by religious enthusiasm and an adventurous spirit, seem to have visited Iceland, and one, Dicuil by name, left written evidence, about 825, confirming the story of the island Thule, which some of the brethren visited, and reported there was no darkness at the summer solstice. Other and Wulfstan, athirst for discovery and knowledge, set sail in the reign of King Alfred, and in all probability the former rounded the North Cape and visited the shores of Lapland, though his exact discoveries cannot now be identified.
Sebastian Cabot