John Balak. It is not known what success attended this Alferius or Oliver in his scheme, or what subsequently became of him; unless, indeed, it be assumed that he is the Oliver Brunel (or Bunel), concerning whom several unconnected notices are met with, and with respect to whom various conflicting opinions have been entertained. The early history of the discovery of Novaya Zemlya would hardly be complete were these notices and opinions passed over in silence. The first mention made of this individual is by Gerrit de Veer, when speaking, in page 30 of the present work, of “a great creeke, which William Barents iudged to be the place where Oliuer Brunel had been before, called Costincsarch”. The next is Henry Hudson, who, on his second voyage to discover a passage to the East Indies by the north-east, in 1608, having entered into this same creek, in the hope of its affording him a way through into the Sea of Kara, expresses himself as follows:—“This place vpon Noua Zembla is another then that which the Hollanders call Costing Sarch, discouered by Oliuer Brownell: and William Barentsons obseruation doth witnesse the same. It is layd in plot by the Hollanders out of his true place too farre north; to what end I know not, unlesse to make it hold course with the compasse, not respecting the variation.” [102] In this, however, Hudson was mistaken. The creek into which he entered was really Kostin Shar; and his error in supposing it to be another “than that which the Hollanders call Costing Sarch”, arose from the circumstance that in the Dutch maps that name had been removed northwards to Matfeiov-tsar (Matvyéeva Shar) or Matyushin Shar, and made to supersede the original name. The whole of Hudson’s account of his visit to Novaya Zemlya is of so interesting a character, that it is deemed deserving of a place in the Appendix to the present work, [103] especially as it has hitherto been either overlooked or else made use of to very little good purpose. In 1611, three years after Hudson’s visit to Novaya Zemlya, Josiah Logan went on a voyage to the Pechora, and on the 27th of August of that year we find the following entry in his journal, which, like that of Hudson, is published by Purchas: [104]—“We came to an iland called Mezyou Sharry, being sixtie versts to the eastwards of Suatinose, and it is about ten versts in length and two versts broad. At the east end thereof Oliver Brunell was carried into harbour by a Russe, where he was land-locked, hauing the iland on the one side and the mayne on the other.” It is here manifest that Logan’s “Mezyou Sharry” Island is the Mezhdusharsky Ostrov, or “the island between the two straits”, of the Russians. [105]