Note 68 — THE FYRST PART OF THE NAUIGATION INTO THE NORTH SEAS.

So veel als men uyten mars oversien mocht, altemael een effen velt ys. This passage is deserving of special notice, on account of the following statement in Captain Scoresby’s Account of the Arctic Regions:—“The term field was given to the largest sheets of ice by a Dutch whale fisher. It was not until a period of many years after the Spitzbergen fishery was established, that any navigator attempted to penetrate the ice, or that any of the most extensive sheets of ice were seen. One of the ships resorting to Smeerenberg for the fishery, put to sea on one occasion, when no whales were seen, persevered westward to a considerable length, and accidentally fell in with some immense flakes of ice, which, on his return to his companions, he described as truly wonderful, and as resembling fields in the extent of their surface. Hence the application of the term ‘field’ to this kind of ice. The discoverer of it was distinguished by the title of ‘field finder’.”—Vol. i, p. 243. ↑