So long as one need not fly over clouds or fog all goes well. With steadiness it is possible to control the course over the ground and steer the plane straight to the Pole by territorial navigation. During the two first hours, after we had passed Spitzbergen’s north coast, we had thick fog under us and got no drift observations. As soon as we could get these the solar-compass was corrected. We had, however, in the meantime deviated so far westwards that the indicator pointed well over to the west side of the Pole. One must pay particular attention to the fact that the solar-compass only indicates a northward direction so long as one is on the same meridian which the compass was adjusted to. If one has deviated to the side and continues to steer according to the solar-compass, one will set a course directly parallel with the meridian for which the compass was adjusted when starting. For a new adjustment of the compass, so that it points towards the Pole, one must in every case take the bearings. Both during the northward journey, and during the homeward flight, the solar-compasses were of the utmost benefit to us. Without these and depending only on the magnetic compasses we should have been very much less confident. The selection of our magnetic compasses was only settled after we had studied the various types most analytically, paying particular attention to the conditions which they would have to answer to in the Arctic Ocean. I should like here to mention a common mistake founded on a popular idea, that the _Magnetic_ Pole lies at the _North_ Pole. The globe is a great magnet which has two magnetic points, a North Pole and a South Pole, and fortunately the Magnetic Poles do not lie in the same places as the geographical poles. The earth’s magnetic North Pole, which draws towards itself the compasses’ _North_, lies on the north coast of Canada about 70° N. and 95° W. long. In general this is called for convenience the magnetic North Pole. Its position, as is well known, was verified by Roald Amundsen during the Gjoa expedition. Looking at the map, it will be discovered that the magnetic pole lies about an equal length from the geographical North Pole as from Spitzbergen. Therefore it stands to reason that the compass which can be used in Spitzbergen can therefore be used in the fairway from there to the Pole. The one thing which might cause us moments of misgiving was the magnitude of the compass’s variations in the district we wished to reach. (There is little data resulting from exact observation to give us the reason of these variations.)