The Voyage Of The Vega Round Asia And Europe Part 22

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE SLOOP UTRENNAJA SARIA. ]

[Footnote 159: Compare: "The names of the places that the Russes sayle by, from Pechorskoie Zauorot to Mongozey" (_Purchas_, III. p.

539): "The voyage of Master Josias Logan to Pechora, and his wintering there with Master William Pursglove and Marmaduke Wilson, Anno 1611" (_loc. cit._ p. 541): "Extracts taken out of two letters of Josias Logan from Pechora, to Master Hakluyt, Prebend of Westminster" (_loc. cit._ p. 546): "Other obseruations of the sayd William Pursglove" (_loc. cit._ p. 550). The last paper contains good information regarding the Obi, Tas, Yenisej, Pjasina, Chatanga, and Lena. ]

[Footnote 160: The stringent regulations regarding fasting of the Russians, especially the Old Believers, if they be literally observed, form an insuperable obstacle to the colonisation of high-northern regions, in which, to avoid scurvy, man requires an abundant supply of fresh flesh. Thus, undoubtedly, religious prejudices against certain kinds of food caused the failure of the colony of Old Believers which was founded in 1767 on Kolgujev Island, in order that its members might undisturbed use their old church books and cross themselves in the way they considered most proper. The same cause also perhaps conduced to the failure of the attempts which are said to have been made after the destruction of Novgorod by Ivan the Terrible in 1570 by fugitives from that town to found a colony on Novaya Zemlya (_Historische Nachrichten von den Samojeden und den Lapplandern_, Riga und Mietau, 1769, p. 28). This book was first printed in French at Konigsberg in 1762. The author was Klingstedt, a Swede in the Russian service, who long lived at Archangel. ]

[Footnote 161: The statement is incredible, and probably originated in some mistake. To form such a heap of walruses at least 50,000 animals would have been required, and it is certain that fifteen men could not have killed so many. If we a.s.sume that in the statement of the length and breadth, feet ought to stand in place of fathoms, we get the still excessive number of 1,500 to 3,000 killed animals.

Probably instead of 90 we should have 9, in which case the heap would correspond to about 500 walruses and seals killed. The walrus tusks collected weighed 40 pood, which again indicates the capture of 150 to 200 animals. ]

[Footnote 162: _Witsen_, p. 915. Klingstedt states that fifty soldiers with their wives and children were removed in 1648 to Pustosersk, and that the vojvode there had so large an income that in three or four years he could acc.u.mulate 12,000 to 15,000 roubles (_Historische Nachrichten von den Samojeden_, &c., p. 53). ]

[Footnote 163: According to Lutke, p. 70. Hamel, _Tradescant d.

altere_, gives the date 1742-44. ]

[Footnote 164: Thus on the first map in an atlas published in 1737 by the St. Petersburg Academy, Novaya Zemlya is delineated as a peninsula projecting from Taimur Land north of the Pjasina. ]

[Footnote 165: Properly "Mate, with the rank of Lieutenant," from which we may conclude that Rossmuislov wanted the usual education of an officer. ]

[Footnote 166: These remarkable voyages were described for the first time, after the accounts of Zivolka, by the academician K.E. v. Baer in _Bulletin scientifique publ. par l'Acad. Imp. des Sciences de St.

Petersburg_, t. ii. No. 9, 10, 11 (1837). Before this there does not appear to have been in St. Petersburg any knowledge of Pachtussov's voyages, the most remarkable which the history of Russian Polar Sea exploration has to show. ]

[Footnote 167: The carba.s.se was named, like the vessels of Lasarev and Lutke, the _Novaya Zemlya_. It was forty-two feet long, fourteen feet beam, and six feet deep, decked fore and aft, and with the open s.p.a.ce between protected by canvas from breakers. ]

[Footnote 168: The details of Pachtussov's voyages are taken partly from von Baer's work already quoted, partly from Carl Svenske, _Novaya Zemlya_, &c., St. Petersburg, 1866 (in Russian, published at the expense of M.K. Sidoroff), and J. Sporer, _Nowaja Semla in geographischer, naturhistorischer und volkswirthschaftlicher Beziehung, nach den Quellen bearbsitet_. Erganz-Heft. No. 21 zu Peterm. _Geogr. Mittheilungen_, Gotha, 1867. ]

[Footnote 169: _Bulletin scientifique publie par l'Academie Imp. de St. Petersburg_, t. ii. (1837), p. 315; iii. (1838), p. 96, and other places. ]

[Footnote 170: Paul von Krusenstern, _Skizzen aus sienem Seemannsleben. Seinen Freunden gewidmet_. Hirschberg in Silesia, without date. ]

[Footnote 171: Information regarding the mode of life of the Russian hunters on the coasts of Spitzbergen is to be found in P.A. le Roy, _Relation des avantures arrivees a quatre matelots Russes, &c._ 1766; Tschitschagov's _Reise nach dem Eismeer_, St. Petersburg, 1793; John Bacstrom, _Account of a voyage to Spitzbergen_, 1780, London, 1808 (as stated; I have not seen this work); B.M. Keilhau, _Reise i ost og Vest Finmarken, samt til Beeren-Eiland og Spetsbergen i Aarene 1827 og 1828_, Christiania, 1831; A. Erman, _Archiv fur wissenschastliche Kunde von Russland_, Part 13 (1854), p. 260; K. Chydenius, _Svenska expeditionen till Spetsbergen 1861_ (p. 435); Duner and Nordenskiold, _Svenska Expeditioner till Spetsbergen och Jan Mayen 1863 och 1864_ (p. 101). ]

[Footnote 172: Before 1858 there is to be found in Petermann's _Mittheilungen_ only a single notice of the Norwegian Spitzbergen hunting, the existence of which was at the time probably known to no great number of European geographers. ]

[Footnote 173: The first account of this voyage was published in _ofversigt af Svenska Vetenskaps-akademiens forhandlingar_, 1870, p. 111. ]

[Footnote 174: _Athenoeum_, 1869, p. 498. Petermann's _Mittheilungen_, 1869, p. 391. ]

[Footnote 175: Palliser's game consisted of 49 walruses, 14 Polar bears and 25 seals; that of the working hunters was many times greater. All the vessels which went from Tromsoe that year captured 805 walruses, 2,302 seals, 53 bears, &c. ]

[Footnote 176: Sidoroff too started in 1869 on a north-east voyage in a steamer of his own, the _George_. However, he only reached the Petchora, and the statement that went the round of the press, that the _George_ actually reached the Ob, is thus one of the many mistakes which so readily find their way into the news of the day. ]

[Footnote 177: Petermann's _Mittheilungen_, 1871, p. 97. Along with Ulve's, Mack's, and Quale's voyages, Petermann refers to a voyage round Novaya Zemlya by T. Torkildsen. In this case, however, Petermann was exposed to a possibly unintended deception.

Torkildsen, who visited the Polar Sea for the first time in 1870, indeed made the voyage round Novaya Zemlya, but only as a rescued man on Johannesen's vessel. Torkildsen's own vessel, the _Alfa_, had been wrecked on the 13th July at the bottom of Kara Bay, after which the skipper and six men were saved by Johannesen, yet by no means so that Torkildsen, as is stated by Petermann, had the least command of the vessel that saved him. (Cf. _Tromsoe Stiftstidende_, 1871, No. 23.) ]

[Footnote 178: _Tromsoe Stiftstidende_, 1871, No. 83; Petermann's _Mittheilungen_, 1872, p. 384. ]

[Footnote 179: Cf. _The Three Voyages of William Barents_, by Gerrit de Veer, 2nd Edition, with an Introduction by Lieutenant Koolemans Beynen. London, 1876 (Works issued by the Hakluyt Society, No. 54). ]

[Footnote 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 circ.u.mnavigate the large island situated to the east of Spitzbergen, which had been seen in 1864 by Duner and me from the top of White Mount in the interior of Stor Fjord. ]

[Footnote 181: Nor does s.p.a.ce 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. ]

[Footnote 182: Kongl. _Svenska Vetenskaps-akademiens handlingar_, 1869. ]

[Footnote 183: At Mussel Bay, too, during the winter of 1872-73, the greatest 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. ]

[Footnote 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. ]

[Footnote 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. ]

[Footnote 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 pa.s.sed Matotschkin Schar on the 7th September. ]

[Footnote 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. ]

[Footnote 188: _Deutsche Geographische Blatter_, Bremen, 1870, i. p.

216, and ii. p. 35. ]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Map of Port d.i.c.kson, by G. Bove. Map of Cape Bolvan on Vaygats Island, by the author. The _Lena's_ cruise in Malygin Sound, by A. Hovgaard. Map of Cape Chelyuskin, by G. Bove ]

CHAPTER VII.

Departure from Port d.i.c.kson--Landing on a rocky island east of the Yenisej--Self-dead animals--Discovery of crystals on the surface of the drift-ice--Cosmic dust-- Stay in Actinia Bay--Johannesen's discovery of the island Ensamheten--Arrival at Cape Chelyuskin--The natural state of the land and sea there--Attempt to penetrate right eastwards to the New Siberian Islands--The effect of the mist--Abundant dredging-yield--Preobraschenie Island-- Separation from the _Lena_ at the mouth of the river Lena.

When on the morning of the 9th August the _Fraser_ and _Express_ sailed for the point higher up the river where their cargo was lying, the _Vega_ and the _Lena_ were also ready to sail. I, however, permitted the vessels to remain at Port d.i.c.kson a day longer, in order to allow Lieutenant Bove to finish his survey, and for the purpose of determining astronomically, if possible, the position of this important place. In consequence of a continuous fog, however, I had as little opportunity of doing so on this occasion as during the voyage of 1875, which serves to show of what sort the weather is during summer at the place where the warm water of the Yenisej is poured into the Arctic Ocean. It was thus not until the morning of the 10th August that the _Vega_ and the _Lena_ weighed anchor in order to continue their voyage. The course was shaped for the most westerly of the islands, which old maps place off the estuary-bay of the Pjasina, and name Kammenni Ostrova (Stone Islands), a name which seems to indicate that in their natural state they correspond to the rocky islands about Port d.i.c.kson. The sky was hid by mist, the temperature of the air rose to +10.4 C.; that of the water was at first +10, afterwards +8; its salinity at the surface of the sea was inconsiderable. No ice was seen during the course of the day. Favoured by a fresh breeze from the south-east, the _Vega_ could thus begin her voyage with all sail set. Small rocky islands, which are not to be found on the chart, soon reminded us of the untrustworthiness of the maps. This, together with the prevailing fog, compelled Captain Palander to sail forward with great caution, keeping a good outlook and sounding constantly. Warm weather and an open sea were also favourable for the next day's voyage. But the fog now became so dense, that the _Vega_ had to lie-to in the morning at one of the many small islands which we still met with on our way.

Dr. Kjellman, Dr. Almquist, Lieutenant Nordquist, and I, landed here. The bare and utterly desolate island consisted of a low gneiss rock, rising here and there into cliffs, which were shattered by the frost and rather richly clothed with lichens. On the more low-lying places the rock was covered with a layer of gravel, which, through drying and consequent contraction, had burst into six-sided figures, mostly from 0.3 to 0.5 metre in diameter. The interior of the figures was completely bare of vegetation, only in the cracks there was to be seen an exceedingly scanty growth of stunted mosses, lichens, and flowering plants. Of the last-named group there were found fifteen species,[189] which could with success, or more correctly without succ.u.mbing, survive the struggle for existence on the little poor archipelago, protected by no mountain heights, from the storms of the Polar Sea; but of these species, perhaps a couple seldom develop any flowers. The mosses, too, were in great part without fruit, with the exception of those which grew on the margin, formed of hard clay covered with mud, of a pool, filled with brackish water and lying close to the sea-margin. A large number of pieces of driftwood scattered round this pool showed that the place was occasionally overflowed with sea-water, which thus appears to have been favourable to the development of the mosses. Of lichens Dr. Almquist found a number of species, well developed, and occurring in comparative abundance. On the contrary, the sea, although the surrounding rocky islands indicated a good bottom for algae, was so completely dest.i.tute of the higher algae, that only a single microscopic species was found by Dr. Kjellman. No mammalia were seen, not even the usual inhabitant of the desolate rocky islands of the Polar Sea, the Polar bear, who, in regions where he has not made acquaintance with the hunter's ball or lance, in secure reliance on his. .h.i.therto unvanquished might, seldom neglects to scrutinise the newly arrived guests from the tops of high rocks or ice-blocks. We saw here only six species of birds. The first of these that attracted our attention was the snow-bunting, which had left the more fertile mountain heights of the south to choose this bare and desolate island in the Arctic Ocean for its breeding-place, and now fluttered round the stone mounds, where it had its nest, with unceasing twitter, as if to express its satisfaction with its choice. Further, two species of waders, _Tringa maritima_ and _Phalaropus fulicarius_, were observed running restlessly about the beach to collect their food, which consists of insects. The birds that were killed often had their crops full of the remains of insects, although living at a place where the naturalist has to search for hours to find a dozen gnats or their equals in size, a circ.u.mstance that tells very favourably for these birds' powers of vision, of locomotion, and of apprehension. It is difficult in any case to understand what it is that attracts this insectivorous bird to one of the regions that is poorest in insect life in the whole world. The glaucous gulls' plunderer, the skua, and its chastiser the bold tern, were also observed, as were a few barnacle geese. On the other hand, no eiders were met with. All the birds named occurred only in inconsiderable numbers, and there was nothing found here resembling the life which prevails on a Spitzbergen fowl-island. Finally, it may be mentioned that Lieutenant Nordquist found under stones and pieces of drift-wood a few insects, among them a beetle (a _staphylinid_). Dr. Stuxberg afterwards found a specimen of the same insect species at Cape Chelyuskin itself. No beetle is found on Spitzbergen, though the greater portion of that group of islands is, in respect of climate, soil, and vegetation, much better favoured than the region now in question. This seems to me to show that the insect fauna of Spitzbergen, exceedingly inconsiderable and limited in numbers as it is, has migrated thither in comparatively recent times, and in how high a degree the migration of beetles is rendered difficult by their inability to pa.s.s broad expanses of water.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE VEGA AND LENA MOORED TO AN ICE-FLOE. On the morning of the 12th August, 1878. (After a drawing by O. Nordquist.) ]

By afternoon the air had again cleared somewhat, so that we could sail on. A piece of ice was seen here and there, and at night the ice increased for a little to an unpleasant extent. Now, however, it did not occur in such quant.i.ty as to prove an obstacle to navigation in clear weather or in known waters.

On the 12th August we still sailed through considerable fields of scattered drift-ice, consisting partly of old ice of large dimensions, partly of very rotten year's ice. It formed, however, no serious obstacle to our advance, and nearer the sh.o.r.e we would probably have had quite open water, but of course it was not advisable to go too near land in the fog and unknown waters, without being obliged. A large number of fish (_Gadus polaris_) were seen above the foot of a large block of ground ice, near which we lay-to for some hours. Next day we saw near one of the islands, where the water was very clear, the sea-bottom bestrewed with innumerable fish of the same species. They had probably perished from the same cause, which often kills fish in the river Ob in so great numbers that the water is infected, namely, from a large shoal of fish having been enclosed by ice in a small hole, where the water, when its surface has frozen, could no longer by absorption from the air replace the oxygen consumed, and where the fish have thus been literally drowned. I mention this inconsiderable _find_ of some self-dead fish, because self-dead vertebrate animals, even fish, are found exceedingly seldom. Such _finds_ therefore deserve to be noted with much greater care than, for instance, the occurrence of animal species in the neighbourhood of places where they have been seen a thousand times before. During my nine expeditions in the Arctic regions, where animal life during summer is so exceedingly abundant, the case just mentioned has been one of the few in which I have found remains of recent vertebrate animals which could be proved to have died a natural death. Near hunting-grounds there are to be seen often enough the remains of reindeer, seals, foxes, or birds that have died from gunshot wounds, but no self-dead Polar bear, seal, walrus, white whale, fox, goose, auk, lemming or other vertebrate.

The Polar bear and the reindeer are found there in hundreds, the seal, walrus, and white whale in thousands, and birds in millions.[190] These animals must die a "natural" death in untold numbers. What becomes of their bodies? Of this we have for the present no idea, and yet we have here a problem of immense importance for the answering of a large number of questions concerning the formation of fossiliferous strata. It is strange in any case that on Spitzbergen it is easier to find vertebrae of a gigantic lizard of the Trias, than bones of a self-dead seal, walrus, or bird, and the same also holds good of more southerly inhabited lands.

On the 13th August we again sailed past a large number of small rocks or islands. The sea was at first pretty free of ice, but was afterwards bestrewed with even, thin pieces of drift-ice, which were not forced up on each other, and thus had not been exposed in winter to any ice-pressure. This ice did not cause any inconvenience to the navigation, but at the same time all was wrapt in a very close mist, which soon compelled us to anchor near the sh.o.r.e in a little bay. I endeavoured without success to determine the position of the place by astronomical observations. Along the sh.o.r.e there still remained nearly everywhere a pretty high snow and ice-foot, which in the fog presented the appearance of immense glaciers. The land besides was free of ice. In respect of its geological formation and its animals and plants it resembled completely the island I have just described.

But the sea-water here was clear and salt, and the dredging therefore yielded to Dr. Kjellman some large algae, and to Dr.

Stuxberg a large number of marine evertebrates.

When the fog lightened, we immediately steamed on, but we had scarcely got to sea before we were again wrapped in so close a fog that we were compelled to lie-to for the night beside a large piece of drift-ice. The hempen tangles were used, and brought up a very abundant yield of large, beautiful animal forms, a large number of asterids, Astrophyton, Antedon, &c. There was besides made here an exceedingly remarkable, and to me still, while I write, a very enigmatical _find_.

For several years back I have been zealous for the examination of all substances of the nature of dust which fall to the surface of the earth with rain or snow, and I have proved that a portion of them is of cosmic origin. This inconsiderable fall of dust is thus of immense importance for the history of the development of our globe, and we regard it, besides, with the intense interest which we inevitably cherish for all that brings us an actual experience regarding the material world beyond our globe. The inhabited countries of the earth, however, are less suitable for such investigations, as the particles of cosmic dust falling down here in very limited quant.i.ty can only with difficulty be distinguished from the dust of civilization, arising from human dwellings, from the offal of industry, from furnaces and the chimneys of steam-engines.

The case is quite different on the snow and ice-fields of the High North, remote from human habitations and the tracks of steamers.

Every foreign grain of dust can here he easily distinguished and removed, and there is a strong probability that the offal of civilization is here nearly wholly wanting. It is self-evident from this that I would not be disposed to neglect the first opportunity for renewed investigations in the direction indicated, our involuntary rest at the drift-ice field offered.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HAIRSTAR FROM THE TAIMUR COAST. _Antedon Eschrichtii_, J. MuLLER. Three-fifths of the natural size. ]