a ledge near where Zaninovich had lain. After they were drawn up, they gave expression to their joy, first by rolling themselves vigorously in the snow, and then by licking the hands of the party. Haller was next raised to the level of the sledge, so that he might cut the ropes which fastened the loading. The articles were brought up one by one. Nothing of any importance had been lost. The party now descended the glacier, and the three men from Cape Schrötter returned there, while Payer and his companions camped at Cape Habermann. A route along the west coast of Crown-Prince Rudolf’s Land was now followed. When Cape Brorok was reached, the latitude was found to be 81° 45′. Payer here writes: “To the north-west we saw at first nothing but ice up to the horizon; even with the telescope of the theodolite I could not decide for the existence of land, which Orel’s sharp eye discovered in the far distance.” Payer also remarks that, in the Arctic regions, it often happens that banks of fog on the horizon assume the character of distant ranges, for the small height to which these banks rise in the cold air causes them to be very sharply defined. It is also very common, he says, to make the same mistake in the case of mists arising from the waste water of enormous glaciers. When Cape Auk was reached, a dark water-sky appeared in the north, and great numbers of birds were seen. Seals lay on the ice, and traces of bears and foxes were numerous. Had Payer been inclined to believe, like Hayes, in the existence of an open Polar Sea, these signs of a richer animal-life would have gone far to support the belief. Payer, however, called this belief an “antiquated hypothesis.” The ice was now so thin that they thought it expedient to tie themselves together with a long rope. Ascending an iceberg in Teplitz Bay, the open sea was seen stretching far to the west; and at Cape Säulen the open water reached the coast. Here Payer ascended a height to reconnoitre the track for next day. Land was no longer visible towards the north. The 12th April was the last day of advance in a northerly direction. The march lay over snowy slopes to the summits of the coast-range, from 1000 to 3000 feet high. At noon the latitude was taken at Cape Germania, and found to be 81° 57′. They reached Cape Fligely in five hours, and here decided to turn back. Payer estimated the latitude of this point to be 82° 5′. Rudolf’s Land still stretched in a north-easterly direction towards a cape named after Sherard Osborne. From Cape Fligely it could be seen that the open water was simply a “Polynia” surrounded by old ice. Blue mountain-ranges were believed to be visible in the distant north, and were named “King Oscar Land” and “Petermann Land.”