and from the Petchora
to the Ob, that a West-European ship was wrecked at the mouth of the
Ob, and its crew killed by the Samoyeds who lived there. The Russian
also said that it was an easy matter to sail from Vaygats to the
mouth of the Ob.

1612. The whaling captain JAN CORNELISZ. VAN HOORN endeavoured to
sail north of Novaya Zemlya towards the east, but met with ice in
77 deg. N.L., which compelled him to return (_Witsen_, p. 906).

1625. CORNELIS BOSMAN, at the instance of the Northern Company of
the Netherlands, with a vessel of 90 tons, manned by 24 men, and
provisioned for two and a half years, passed through Yugor Schar
eastwards, but fell in with so much ice in the Kara Sea that he was
compelled to seek for a harbour in that sound. There he waited for
more favourable conditions, but was finally compelled by storm and
ice to return with his object unaccomplished. (S. Muller,
_Geschiedenis der Noordsche Compagnie_, Utrecht, 1874, p. 185.)

1653.[144] This year a Danish expedition was sent out to the
North-east. An account of the voyage was given by DE LA MARTINIERE,
surgeon to the expedition, in a work published for the first time at
Paris in 1671, with the following title: _Voyage des Pais
Septentrionaux. Dans lequel se void les moeurs, maniere de vivre, &c.
superstitions des Norweguiens, Lappons, Kiloppes, Borandiens,
Syberiens, Samojedes, Zembliens, &c. Islandois, enrichi de plusieurs
figures_.[145] This work afterwards attained a considerable
circulation, doubtless in consequence of Martiniere's easy style,
contrasting so strongly with the common dry ship's-log manner, and
the large number of wonderful stories he narrates, without the least
regard to truth or probability. He is the Munchhausen of the
North-east voyages. The Norse peasants, for instance, are said to be
all slaves to the nobles, who have sovereign power over their
property, tyrannise over their inferiors, and are prone to
insurrection. The elks are said to be liable to falling sickness,
and therefore fall down in convulsions when they are hunted--hence
their name "eleend." Sailors are said to have purchased on the
north-west coast of Norway for ten crowns and a pound of tobacco
three knots of wind from the Lapps living there, who were all
magicians; when the first knot was loosed, a gentle breeze arose,
the second gave a strong gale, the third a storm, during which the
vessel was in danger of being wrecked.[146]. Novaya Zemlya is stated
to