Latitude. Here They Built A Smaller Vessel Out Of The
Remains Of The One They Had Brought From Holland, And Arrived The Following
Summer At Kola, In Lapland.
In 1653, Frederic III, king of Denmark, sent three vessels to discover a
north-east passage:
It is said that they actually passed through Waygats'
Straits; but that in the bay beyond these straits they found insurmountable
obstacles from the ice and cold, and consequently were obliged to return.
The last attempt made in the seventeenth century, was by the English: it
was proposed and undertaken by John Wood, an experienced seaman, who had
paid particular attention to the voyages that had been made to the north.
His arguments in favour of a north-east passage were, that whales had been
found near Japan, with English and Dutch harpoons in them; and that the
Dutch had found temperate weather near the Pole, and had sailed 300 leagues
to the east of Nova Zembla. The first argument only proved, that there was
sea between Nova Zembla and Japan; but not that it was navigable, though
passable for whales: the other two positions were unfounded. Wood, however,
persuaded the Duke of York to send him out in 1676. He doubled the North
Cape, and reached 76 degrees of north latitude. One of the ships was
wrecked off the coast of Nova Zembla, and Wood returned in the other, with
an opinion that a north-east passage is impracticable, and that Nova Zembla
is a part of the continent of Greenland.
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