Most probably the Norwegians had their attention directed at a very early period to the existence of a land lying to the north of Finmarken by the troops of migratory birds which they saw flying northward in spring, and by the casual visits of sea-bears, which the drift-ice carried to the south. There can be no doubt that they were the first discoverers of Spitzbergen, but their history contains no positive records of the fact, and it was not before the sixteenth century that Europe first became acquainted with that desolate archipelago. Sir Hugh Willoughby may possibly have seen it in 1559, but it is certain that on June 19, 1596, Barentz, Heemskerke, and Ryp, who had sailed in two ships from Amsterdam to discover the north-eastern passage to India, landed on its western coast, and gave it the name it bears to the present day. In the year 1607 it was visited by the unfortunate Henry Hudson, and four years later the first English whalers were fitted out by the Russia Company in London to fish in the bays of Spitzbergen, or East Greenland, as it was at that time called, being supposed to be the eastern prolongation of that vast island. Here our countrymen met with Dutchmen, Norwegians, and Biscayans from Bayonne and the ports of Northern Spain, and commercial rivalry soon led to the usual quarrels. In the year 1613 James I. granted the Russia Company a patent, giving them the exclusive right to fish in the Spitzbergen waters, and seven ships of war were sent out to enforce their pretensions. The Dutch, the Norwegians, and the Biscayans were driven away; a cross with the name of the King of England was erected on the shore, and Spitzbergen received the name of “King James his Newland.” This triumph, however, was but of short duration, and after a struggle, in which none of the combatants gained any decisive advantage, all parties came at last to an amicable agreement. The English received for their share the best stations on the south-western coast, along with English Bay and Magdalena Bay. The Dutch were obliged to retreat to the north, and chose Amsterdam Island, with Smeerenberg Bay, as the seat of their operations. The Danes or Norwegians established their head-quarters on Dane’s Island; the Hamburgers, who also came in for their share, in Hamburg Bay; and the French or Biscayans on the north coast, in Red Bay. At present a right or smooth-backed whale rarely shows itself in the Spitzbergen waters, but at that time it was so abundant that frequently no less than forty whalers used to anchor in a single bay, and send out their boats to kill these cetaceans, who came there for the purpose of casting their young in the sheltered friths and channels. The fat of the captured whales was immediately boiled in large kettles on the shore, and the bays of Spitzbergen presented a most animated spectacle during the summer season.