THE POLES--FRANKLIN--ROSS--NORDENSKIOLD--NANSEN Almost the whole of the explorations which we have hitherto described or referred to had for their motive some practical purpose, whether to reach the Spice Islands or to hunt big game.

Even the excursions of Davis, Frobisher, Hudson, and Baffin in pursuit of the north-west passage, and of Barentz and Chancellor in search of the north-east passage, were really in pursuit of mercantile ends.

It is only with James Cook that the era of purely scientific exploration begins, though it is fair to qualify this statement by observing that the Russian expedition under Behring, already referred to, was ordered by Peter the Great to determine a strictly geographical problem, though doubtless it had its bearings on Russian ambitions.

Behring and Cook between them, as we have seen, settled the problem of the relations existing between the ends of the two continents Asia and America, but what remained still to the north of _terra firma_ within the Arctic Circle?
That was the problem which the nineteenth century set itself to solve, and has very nearly succeeded in the solution.

For the Arctic Circle we now possess maps that only show blanks over a few thousand square miles.
This knowledge has been gained by slow degrees, and by the exercise of the most heroic courage and endurance.