The current still
flows westward, bearing now large quantities of driftwood out of the
Mackenzie River.
At the name of Sir Alexander Mackenzie, also, we
might pause, and talk over the bold achievements of another Arctic
hero; but we pass on, by a rugged and inhospitable coast, unfit for
vessels of large draught - pass the broad mouth of the Youcon, pass
Point Barrow, Icy Cape, and are in Behring Strait. Had we passed
on, we should have found the Russian Arctic coast line, traced out
by a series of Russian explorers; of whom the most illustrious -
Baron Von Wrangell - states, that beyond a certain distance to the
northward there is always found what he calls the Polynja (open
water). This is the fact adduced by those who adhere to the old
fancy that there is a sea about the Pole itself quite free from ice.
We pass through Behring Straits. Behring, a Dane by birth, but in
the Russian service, died here in 1741, upon the scene of his
discovery. He and his crew, victims of scurvy, were unable to
manage their vessel in a storm; and it was at length wrecked on a
barren island, there, where "want, nakedness, cold, sickness,
impatience, and despair, were their daily guests," Behring, his
lieutenant, and the master died.
Now we must put a girdle round the world, and do it with the speed
of Ariel. Here we are already in the heats of the equator.
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