Letters from High Latitudes by Lord Dufferin
page 213 of 305 (69%)
page 213 of 305 (69%)
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which are said to exist in the upper strata of the
sandstone formation. This expectation was doomed to complete disappointment. Before we had got within six miles of the shore, it became evident that the report of the Hammerfest Sea-horseman was too true. Between us and the land there extended an impenetrable barrier of packed ice, running due east and west, as far as the eye could reach. [Figure: fig-p162.gif] What was now to be done? If a continuous field of ice lay 150 miles off the southern coast of Spitzbergen, what would be the chance of getting to the land by going further north? Now that we had received ocular proof of the veracity of the Hammerfest skipper in this first particular, was it likely that we should have the luck to find the remainder of his story untrue? According to the track he had jotted down for me on the chart, the ice in front stretched right away west in an unbroken line, to the wall of ice which we had seen running to the north, from the upper end of Jan Mayen. Only a week had elapsed since he had actually ascertained the impracticability of reaching a higher latitude,--what likelihood could there be of a channel having been opened up to the northward during so short an interval? Such was the series of insoluble problems by which I posed myself, as we stood vainly smacking our lips at the island, which lay so tantalizingly beyond our reach. |
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