Note 116 — INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST EDITION.

The several vessels composing the fleet having assembled at the Texel, they all sailed out of Mars Diep on the morning of Sunday, the 2d of July, 1595. It was not till the 10th of August that they passed the North Cape, and on the 17th they fell in with ice, being then about fifty miles distant from the coast of Novaya Zemlya. On the following day they reached the island of “Matfloe”,116 and on the 19th came to the mouth of the strait to the south of Vaigats Island (Yugorsky Shar), where they found the ice to lie in such quantities, “that the entire channel was closed up as far as the eye could see, so that it had the appearance of a continent, which was most frightful to behold”.117 Under these circumstances they scarcely knew how to act, but at length resolved to go into the roadstead called Train-oil Bay (Traenbay118), where, as it was under the shelter of Idol Cape (Afgoden Hoeck), and thus out of the current which set from the strait, there was a little open water.119 The preceding winter appears to have been more than ordinarily severe, and the ice-masses set in motion by the summer’s sun were consequently far greater in quantity than usual. This, coupled with the late period of the year at which, from some unexplained cause, they had commenced their voyage, soon convinced them that they had but little prospect of being able to get forward. On the 20th August, while thus lying in Train-oil Bay, a council was held on board the admiral’s ship, when it was decided that a yacht should be sent to examine the condition of the strait and the probability of their getting through, and also that a party of thirty or forty armed men should proceed across the Island of Vaigats for the same purpose. The yacht could go no further than Cross Point, where the entire sea was found to be covered with ice without the least break or opening; but the crew thence proceeded by land as far as Cape Dispute, though without better success. The party of men—whom De Veer describes120 as fifty-four in number, himself included—returned with a somewhat more favourable report; for they thought they had discovered a practicable passage, because they saw so little ice there.121 In this their experience agreed with that of Pet and Jackman, who found a passage close along the shore, between the ice and the land, at times when the deep sea was entirely filled with ice-masses.122