land to the mouth of the Yenesei in a merchant vessel. As Siberia develops there can be little doubt that this route will become of increasing commercial importance. Professor Nordenskiold, however, encouraged by his easy passage to the Yenesei, determined to try to get round into Bering Strait from that point, and in 1878 he started in the Vega, accompanied by the Lena, and a collier to supply them with coai. On the 19th August they passed Cape Chelyuskin, the most northerly point of the Old World. From here the Lena appropriately turned its course to the mouth of its namesake, while the Vega proceeded on her course, reaching on the 11th September Cape North, within 120 miles of Bering Strait; this cape Cook had reached from the east in 1778. Unfortunately the ice became packed so closely that they could not proceed farther, and they had to remain in this tantalising condition for no less than ten months. On the 18th July, 1879, the ice broke up, and two days later the Vega rounded East Cape with flying colours, saluting the easternmost coast of Asia in honour of the completion of the north-east passage. Baron Nordenskiold has since enjoyed a well-earned leisure from his arduous labours in the north by studying and publishing the history of early cartography, on which he has issued two valuable atlases, containing fac-similes of the maps and charts of the Middle Ages.
General interest thus re-aroused in Arctic exploration brought about a united effort of all the civilised nations to investigate the conditions of the Polar regions. An international Polar Conference was held at Hamburg in 1879, at which it was determined to surround the North Pole for the years 1882-83 by stations of scientific observation, in-
