,[28] which are
appended to this work. On the latter of these Greenland is still
delineated as connected with Norway in the neighbourhood of
Vardoehus. This map, however, is grounded, according to the
statement of the author in the introduction, among other sources, on
the statements of two archbishops of the diocese of Nidaro,[29] to
which Greenland and Finmark belonged, and from whose inhabited parts
expeditions were often undertaken both for trade and plunder, by
land and sea, as far away as to the land of the Beormas. It is
difficult to understand how with such maps of the distribution of
land in the north the thought of the north-east passage could arise,
if voices were not even then raised for an altogether opposite view,
grounded partly on a survival of the old idea, we may say the old
popular belief, that Asia, Europe and Africa were surrounded by
water, partly on stories of Indians having been driven by wind to
Europe, along the north coast of Asia.[30] To these was added in
1539 the map of the north by the Swedish bishop OLAUS MAGNUS,[31]
which for the first time gave to Scandinavia an approximately
correct boundary towards the north. Six hundred years,[32] in any
case, had run their course before Othere found a successor in Sir
Hugh Willoughby; and it is usual to pass by the former, and to
ascribe to the latter the honour of being the first in that long
succession of men who endeavoured to force a passage by the
north-east from the Atlantic Ocean to China.

Here however it ought to be remarked that while such maps as those
of Ziegler were published in western Europe, other and better
knowledge of the regions in question prevailed in the north. For it
may be considered certain that Norwegians, Russians and Karelians
often travelled in boats on peaceful or warlike errands, during the
fifteenth and beginning of the sixteenth century, from the west
coast of Norway to the White Sea, and in the opposite direction,
although we find nothing on record regarding such journeys except
the account that SIGISMUND VON HERBERSTEIN[33] gives, in his famous
book on Russia, of the voyage of GREGORY ISTOMA and the envoy DAVID
from the White Sea to Trondhjem in the year 1496.

The voyage is inserted under the distinctive title _Navigatio per
Mare Glaciale_[34] and the narrative begins with an explanation that
Herbertstein got it from Istoma himself, who, when a youth, had
learned Latin in Denmark. As the reasons for choosing t