The island of Jan Mayen lies in the middle of the wide, deep sea between Norway and Greenland, Iceland and Spitzbergen; and is distant about sixty geographical miles from the coast of Greenland. It was discovered and named after a Dutchman who visited it in the year 1611. It is nine miles in length and one mile in breadth, rocky and mountainous, with only two spots of flat beach suitable for landing-places. The northeast part rises to a height of six thousand eight hundred sixty-three feet, in the lofty Beerenberg, which has a large crater. In the year 1732, Burgomaster Anderson, of Hamburg, reported a decided eruption from a small side crater, and in 1818, Scoresby and another captain saw great pillars of smoke rising from the same place. Of this wonderful isolated, snow-covered peak, Lord Dufferin, in “Letters from High Latitudes,” wrote,— “My delight was of an anchorite catching a glimpse of the seventh heaven.” Jan Mayen lies so near the edge of the ice-fields, that from 1612 to 1640 it afforded the English and Dutch whale-fishers a comfortable station for their train-oil preparation. One ship is reported to have brought home one hundred and ninety-six thousand gallons of oil in a single year. The ice line was reached July 15. “After a foggy day, a light southerly breeze got up, the sails filled, the ship answered the helm once more, and we moved in a north-westerly course between small floes and brashes. A practised ear might now notice a peculiar distant roar, which seemed to come nearer by degrees. It was the sea singing against the still hidden ice. “Nearer and nearer comes the rushing noise. Every man is on deck; when, as with the touch of a magic wand, the mist divides, and a few hundred yards before us lies the ice, in long lines like a deep indented rocky coast, with walls glittering blue in the sun, and the foaming of the waves mounting high, with the top covered with blinding white snow. The eyes of all rested with amazement on this grand panorama; it was a glorious but serious moment, stirred as we were by new thoughts and feelings, by hopes and doubts, by bold and far-reaching expectations.” [Sidenote: _ADRIFT ON THE ICE FLOE_] Up to this time the _Germania_ and _Hansa_ had stood well together with occasional separation in the fogs, and on the 18th of July the officers of the two ships exchanged hospitalities. The next day, through a fatal misunderstanding of signals, the _Hansa_ separated from the _Germania_, and they never met again. [Illustration: JAN MAYEN ISLAND] On the 28th of July, the _Hansa_ stood in 72° 56´ north latitude and 16° 54´ west latitude. The dark rock coast of East Greenland was visible for the first time from Cape Broer Ruys to Cape James.