Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 19.djvu/334

Rh 318 POLAR REGIONS Luke Fox. James. Serous, Middle- ton. Moor. Coats. Hearne. Mac kenzie, Dutch whale fishery, north from Davis Strait ; but it was unjustly dimmed for many years, owing to the omission of Purchas to publish the skilful navigator s tabulated journal and map in his great collection of voyages. It may be mentioned, as an illustration of the value of these early voyages to modern science, that Professor Hansteen of Christiania made use of Baffin s magnetic observations in the compilation of his series of magnetic maps. In 1631 two expeditions were despatched, one by the merchants of London, the others by those of Bristol. In the London ship &quot; Charles &quot; Luke Fox explored the western side of Hudson s Bay as far as the place called &quot; Sir Thomas Roe s Welcome.&quot; In August he encountered Captain James and the Bristol ship &quot; Maria &quot; in the middle of Hudson s Bay, and went north until he reached &quot; North-west Fox his furthest,&quot; in 66 47 N. He then returned home and wrote the most entertaining of all the polar narratives. Captain James was obliged to winter off Charlton Island, in the southern extreme of Baffin s Bay, and did not return until October 1632. Another English voyager, Captain Wood, attempted, without success, to discover a north-east passage in 1676. The 16th and 17th centuries were periods of discovery and daring enterprise, and the results gained by the gallant seamen of those times are marvellous when we consider their insignificant resources and the small size of their vessels. Hudson s Strait and Bay, Davis Strait, and Baffin s Bay, the icy seas from Greenland to Spitzbergen and from Spitzbergen to Nova Zembla, had all been dis covered. The following century was rather a period of reaping the results of former efforts than of discovery. It saw the settlement of the Hudson s Bay Territory and of Greenland, and the development of the whale and seal fisheries. The Hudson s Bay Company was incorporated in 1670, and Prince Rupert sent out Zachariah Gillan, who wintered at Rupert s river. At first very slow progress was made. A voyage undertaken by Mr Knight, who had been appointed governor of the factory at Nelson river, was unfortunate, as his two ships were lost and the crews perished. This was in 1719. In 1722 John Scroggs was sent from Churchill river in search of the missing ships, but merely entered Sir Thomas Roe s Welcome and returned. His reports were believed to offer decisive proofs of the existence of a passage into the Pacific ; and a naval expedition was despatched under the command of Captain Christopher Middleton, consisting of the &quot;Dis covery &quot; pink and the &quot; Furnace &quot; bomb. Wintering in Churchill river, Middleton started in July 1742 and dis covered Wager river and Repulse Bay. In 1746 Captain W. Moor made another voyage in the same direction, and explored the Wager Inlet. Captain Coats, who was in the service of the company 1727-51, wrote a useful account of the geography of Hudson s Bay. Later in the century the Hudson s Bay Company s servants made some important land journeys to discover the shores of the American polar ocean. From 1769 to 1772 Samuel Hearne descended the Coppermine river to the polar sea; and in 1789 Alexander Mackenzie discovered the mouth of the Mac kenzie river. The establishment of the modern Danish settlements in Greenland has already been spoken of under the heading GREENLAND (q.v.). The countrymen of Barents vied with the countrymen of Hudson in the perilous calling which annually brought fleets of ships to the Spitzbergen seas during the 18th century. The Dutch had their large summer station for boiling down blubber at Smeerenberg, near the northern extreme of the west coast of Spitzbergen. Captain Vlamingh, in 1664, advanced as far round the northern end of Nova Zembla as the winter quarters of Barents. In 1700 Captain Cornelis Roule is said by Witsen to have sailed north in the longitude of Nova Zembla, and to have seen an extent of 40 miles of broken land. But Theunis Ys, one of the most experienced Dutch navigators, was of opinion that no vessel bad ever been north of the 82d parallel. In 1671 Frederick Martens visited the Spitz- Mart* bergen group, and wrote the best account of its physical features and natural history that existed previous to the time of Scoresby. In 1707 Captains Gilies and Outsger Rep went far to the eastward along the northern shores of Greenland, and saw very high land in 80 N, which has since been known as Gilies Land. The Dutch geographi cal knowledge of Spitzbergen was embodied in the famous chart of the Van Keulens (father and son), 1700-1728. The Dutch whale fishery continued to flourish until the French Revolution, and formed a splendid nursery for training the seamen of the Netherlands. From 1700 to 1775 the fleet numbered 100 ships and upwards. In 1719 the Dutch opened a whale fishery in Davis Strait, and continued to frequent the west coast of Greenland for upwards of sixty years from that time. In the course of 6372 Dutch whaling voyages to Davis Strait between 1719 and 1775 only 38 ships were wrecked. The most flourishing period of the English fishery in Engli the Spitzbergen seas was from 1752 to 1820. Bounties whalt of 40s. per ton were granted by Act of Parliament ; and flslier in 1778 as many as 255 sail of whalers were employed. In order to encourage discovery .5000 were offered in 1776 to the first ship that should sail beyond the 89th parallel (16 Geo. III. c. 6). Among the numerous daring and able whaling captains, Captain Scoresby takes the Score first rank, alike as a successful fisher and a scientific observer. His admirable Account of the Arctic Regions is still a text book for all students of the subject. In 1806 he succeeded in advancing his ship &quot; Resolution &quot; as far north as 81 12 42&quot;. In 1822 he forced his way through the ice which encumbers the approach to land on the east coast of Greenland, and surveyed that coast from 75 down to 69 N., a distance of 400 miles. Scoresby combined the closest attention to his business with much valuable scientific work and no insignificant amount of exploration. The Russians, after the acquisition of Siberia, succeeded Russi in gradually exploring the whole of the northern shores of that vast region. As long ago as 1648 a Cossack named Simon Deshneff equipped a boat expedition in the river Kolyma, passed through the strait afterwards named after Bering, and reached the Gulf of Anadyr. In 1738 a voyage was made by two Russian officers from Archangel to the mouths of the Obi and the Yenisei. Efforts were then made to effect a passage from the Yenisei to the Lena. In 1735 Lieutenant T. Tchelyuskin got as far as Tehel 77 25 N. near the cape which bears his name ; and in y us ^ 1743 he reached that most northern point of Siberia in sledges, in 77 41 N. Captain Vitus Bering, a Dane, Berir; was appointed by Peter the Great to command an expedi tion in 1725. Two vessels were built at Okhotsk, and in July 1728 Bering ascertained the existence of a strait between Asia and America. In 1740 Bering was again employed. He sailed from Okhotsk in a vessel called the &quot;St Paul,&quot; with G. W. Steller on board as naturalist. Their object was to discover the American side of the strait, and they sighted that magnificent peak named by Bering Mount St Elias. The Aleutian Islands were also explored, but the ship was wrecked on an island named after the ill-fated discoverer, and scurvy broke out amongst his crew. Bering himself died there on December 8, 1741. Thirty years after the death of Bering a Russian Liakl merchant named Liakhoff discovered the New Siberia or Liakhoff Islands, and in 1771 he obtained the exclusive