The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1872-01-29

| Whaling Fleet.
We published, on the 22d of December last,
a letter of DR.. Augustus Petermann, the cele-
brated German geographer, giving the plan
which he is now endeavoring to carry out in
new North Polar expedition. His purpose is
announced to be as follows-''To steam right
along the Gulf Stream past the northernmost
Cape Of Asia and the New Siberian Islands
to Behring Strait, and thence to San Fran
CISCO"
This plan Of the greatest of living Arctic
geographers is based upon the recent discov-
cries by the Austrian explorers, verifying the
long-cherished and ably-advocated views Of
several American physicists and of Dr. Peter
mann himself 1t is singular historical CO.
incidence that the conclusion. now forced
upon mind so philosophic and so thoroughly
intuitive as DR.. Petermann's, is precisely that
which was reached by Sebastian Cabot and
earnestly urged in the sixteenth century as
the most accessible pathway through the
frozen ocean, and probably the most unob-
structed gateway" to the North Pole.
Cabot fondly dreamed that along this route
he might find safe and short ship-lane for the
fleets and argosies of his royal master on their
way to China and the East Indies, and save
them the long and stormy passage around the
southern cape of Africa, the Ca6o 2ornsentoso.
But the German geographer has in view a
different object, and is not left to mere con-
lecture regarding that great expanse of ocean
which washes the northern shores of Asia and
receives the immense drainage Of millions of
square miles of Arctic Asatic territory.
To say nothing of the recent labors of
science and photography, such as those of our
own photographers Bent, Wyman and
others of DR.. Petermanns way of thinking-we
have an immense mass of very recently OBJ
tanned and accurate information, which, by its
cumulative and crcumstantial evidence,
proves that an enormous sea or ocean of
tropical water rolls its warming foods in the
very path Dr.. Petermann now proposes to
explore.
1t was in this very region, between Nova
Zembla and Spitzbergen and to the northeast
ward, that the Dutch about 1860, found such
enormous shoals of whales, and where their
whaling fleets, numbering many hundreds of
ships, enriched themselves with the most
profitable cargoes. Science now points to this
as the most promising ground in the world for
whale fisheries There can be very little
doubt that the American whalers will do well
next year to follow up this splendid suggestion
of Petermann, and, instead Of going to the
northwest of Behring Strait, where the great
disaster last year overlook the whaling feet,
to press forward into the very region now
indicated.
The photographic Office at Washington,
under the able and energetic management of
Captain r. II. Wyman, has just completed and
published magnificent chart of the Arctic
Ocean, which conveys all the latest and most
reliable information of these seas, and gives
the seaman in search of whales the most
trustworthy and invaluable information. This
chart appears just in time to meet the sugges-
ton we have made, and it will also be of the
utmost service to any future explorer of the
Arctic Ocean.
The sea of ice northwest of Behring Strait
is landlocked and cannot float it's ice islands
and immense icebergs to the south through
Behring Strait, because that strait is gorged
with the Kuro Siwo, the warm Gulf Stream
of the Pacific moving northward. But in the
region now marked out for exploration by
DR.. Petermann the ice has abundance of sea-
room, and the avenues of warm water streaks
between its fields are broadly indicated.
DR.. Petermano, in the letter to his Ameri-
can friend, Professor Thompson B. Maury,
speaks of possibility of his coming to this
country. He may be sure of receiving the
heartiest welcome from the ''go- ahead" people
of America, who are deeply interested in him
and his great geographical labors and discov-
cries. Our government, through Captain
Wyman and his able coadjutor, Mr.. E. r.
Knorr, the accomplished photographer of the
photographic Bureau, have wisely done DR..
Petermann the honor and itself the service
of translatng and publishing the great work
of the German geographer, entitled ''The
| Eastern and Northern Extensions of the Gulf
Stream"
| Our rich capitalists in the East could well
afford to furnish DR.. Petermann all the money
and men and ships he needs for his explora-
ton 10 the great marine nursery of the right
whale of commerce, in which they are 80 pro-
foundly and permanently interested. With
Petermann's knowledge aud wyman's Arctic
charts to guide the whaler the prospect Of a
splendid harvest Of whales in the Northern
Seas could not be better. Let them take time
by the forelock.
| rOprvcy prRs0vss cosssw