Note 11 — INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST EDITION.

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.