Two years afterwards, in July, 1899, the deserted settlement was visited by the Duke of the Abruzzi, in his expedition in the _Stella Polare_, on his way to the north, a few days before he met with his short imprisonment in the ice in British Channel. His was a successful run all the same, for he was in 82° 4´, to the northward of Crown Prince Rudolf Land, or, as it is now called, Prince Rudolf Island, twenty-seven days out from Archangel. Passing Cape Fligely—the latitude of which was afterwards found to be sixteen miles south of the 82° 5´ Payer had made it—and rounding Cape Auk, the _Stella Polare_ went into winter quarters in Teplitz Bay, whence Captain Umberto Cagni started, on the 11th of March, 1900, for his forty-five days' march towards the North Pole. It was a great disappointment to the Duke to have to stay with the ship instead of leading this well-equipped and thoroughly organised sledge attempt, but owing to an accident two of his fingers had been so severely frost-bitten that they had to be amputated, and, unless a second winter was to be spent in the ice, a start was imperative before he could recover from the operation. Thus all he could do was to assist at the first encounter of the sledges with the pressure ridges and wish Cagni the longest possible journey and a safe return. There was every appearance of the journey being a difficult one, for on the first day a stoppage had to be made every quarter of a mile or thereabouts for a road to be cut through the ridges with ice-axes, while next day a new hindrance was experienced in the young ice in the channels being too thin at times to support the sledges, one of which began to sink and was only extricated with difficulty, so that only one sledge could be allowed on such ice at a time.