He had hoped that he might be able to extend his visit to Franz Josef Land over another year, with a view to making an effort to push north. This, however, was not to be, and when the _Windward_ called for him on August 6, the force of circumstances compelled him and his party to return home to England. This they accordingly proceeded to do, having first established a depot of provisions for the benefit of Andrée, should fortune direct the course of that intrepid explorer thither. [Illustration: FRANZ JOSEF LAND ] CHAPTER XXX NANSEN AND THE “FRAM” A careful study of the history of Arctic travel had convinced Nansen that the routes by which most of his predecessors had attempted to reach the North Pole were either impracticable or else beset by such difficulties that he who could overcome them would be fortunate indeed. Vessels attempting to penetrate far to the north had always been stopped by an impenetrable barrier of ice. Travellers trying to make the journey by sledge had found the ice so rough and the movements of the pack so disconcerting, that they had been invariably compelled to turn back before they were very far on their way, while, so far as has yet been discovered, there is no land in a sufficiently northerly latitude to form a suitable base. The experiences of the _Jeannette_, however, turned his thoughts in another direction. It will be remembered that that ill-fated vessel was caught in the ice near Wrangel Land and drifted thence to New Siberia, where she went down. Three years later there was found, frozen into the drift-ice in the neighbourhood of Julianshaab, on the south-west coast of Greenland, a number of articles which had obviously come from the sunken vessel. These articles were first discovered by the Eskimos, and were afterwards collected by Mr Lytzen, colonial manager at Julianshaab, among them being a list of provisions signed by De Long, a pair of sealskin breeches marked with the name of Louis Noros, one of the _Jeannette’s_ crew, the peak of a cap belonging to Nindemann, another of the sailors, and a manuscript list of the ship’s boats.