Voyage of discovery

“ We submit that in drifting before the wind, or even in a voyage of discovery, many islands lying almost in the wake of the ship might be passed at night without discovery, but it is absolutely impossible to pass a continent without seeing it and touching it at some point. ”

“ We are all inventors, each sailing out on a voyage of discovery, guided each by a private chart, of which there is no duplicate. The world is all gates, all opportunities, strings of tension waiting to be struck; ”

“ For example, first of all, if adventuring into those northern seas, we should, by our industry, make out the discovery, and find a passage, either east or west, we must follow the discovery so as to venture quite through, or else we could not be sure that it was really a discovery ”

“ But perhaps the survey of a wider field may lead us to think that they contain in germ the solution of the problem. To that wider survey we must now address ourselves. It will be long and laborious, but may possess something of the interest and charm of a voyage of discovery, in which we shall visit many strange foreign lands, with strange foreign peoples, and still stranger customs. The wind is in the shrouds: we shake out our sails to it, and leave the coast of Italy behind us for a time. ”

“ I shall satiate my ardent curiosity with the sight of a part of the world never before visited, and may tread a land never before imprinted by the foot of man. These are my enticements, and they are sufficient to conquer all fear of danger or death and to induce me to commence this laborious voyage with the joy a child feels when he embarks in a little boat, with his holiday mates, on an expedition of discovery up his native river. ”

“ I was fully aware that many would go, but that few might stay; for while a voyage of discovery in prospectu possesses great attractions for the imagination, the hardship, danger, and thousand other rude realities, soon dissipate the illusion, and leave the aspirant longing for that home he should never have quitted. ”

“ First: in order that you may and shall with good fortune go on a voyage of discovery in that part of the Ocean Sea within our limits and demarcation; and as it would not be just that since you are going yourselves to perform the aforesaid, other persons should venture to do the same; and considering that you are to have the hardship of this enterprise: it is my will and pleasure (as I now promise) that, for the term of the first ten years ensuing we shall not permit any other person to go on a voyage of discovery by the same route and course that you may take ”

“ As it is our intention, in giving this short abstract of the voyage of Nearchus, to select only such particulars as illustrate the mode of navigation practised among the ancients--the progress of discovery, or the state of commerce,--we shall pass over every topic or fact not connected with these. ”

“ And, although discovery was not the first object of that voyage, I could venture to traverse a far greater space of sea, til then unnavigated; to discover greater tracts of country in high and low south latitudes, and to persevere longer in exploring and surveying more correctly the extensive coasts of those new-discovered countries, than any former navigator perhaps had done during one voyage.
In short, these properties in the ships, with perseverance and resolution in their commanders, will enable them to execute their orders; to go beyond former discoverers ”

“ If her power to penetrate the hitherto unexplored depths of the ocean is at all commensurate with her ability to reach the higher regions of the air, I foresee that our voyage is likely to be fruitful in startling incident and in the discovery of many hitherto unsuspected secrets of nature. ”

“ But the time is coming when, imbued with a taste for science and a spirit of research, they will become ardent explorers of the regions in which they sojourn. Freighted with the knowledge which observation only can impart, and enriched with collections of objects precious to the student of nature, their return after the perils of a distant voyage will then be doubly joyful. ”

“ But it seems equally extraordinary, that even the only two expeditions which within our time have added largely to our knowledge, alike should have neglected the most obvious and almost the only useful means of discovery. ”

“ And while these various works can only after their publication admit of a just opinion being formed as to what has been achieved in this respect by the Expedition, the numerous and valuable collections of objects of natural history already give an idea of the activity and research of each member of the scientific staff in the course of the voyage. ”

“ In the course of my research anomalies have sprung up in every direction. I have felt like a traveler, navigating some mighty river in an unexplored continent. I have seen to the right and the left other channels opening out, all claiming investigation, and promising rich rewards of discovery for the explorer who shall trace them to their source. Time has not allowed me to undertake the whole of a task so vast and so manifold. ”

“ What, however, is human life when weighed in the balance with the progress of science? and with what disinterestedness and enthusiasm must be embued the savants, sailors, and explorers, who give up all the joys of existence to contribute to the best of their power to the progress of knowledge and to the moral and intellectual development of humanity.
With the voyages last recorded the discovery of the earth was completed, and with our account of them our work, which began with the first attempts of the earliest explorers, also closes. ”

“ Here and there the bleached skeletons of these mighty trees, silver-lighted in the sun, some still erect in death, some prone upon the sweet, warm grass that crowns the pink-gray rock, tell with magic brilliancy against the broad sovereignty of impenetrable green that dominates the sea. ”

“ When the attention of a reader is invited to the narrative of a voyage, however interesting and curious in itself, which carries him back to a remote period, it is but reasonable that he should have explained to him the position which such a narrative, arbitrarily selected, holds in the history of the exploration of the country treated of. ”

“ Physiological Discoverers.
dr. jenner.
When we are young, we please ourselves with imagining the delights of discovery in natural science. We paint to ourselves scenes in which the Discoverer figures,—either lighting upon a new planet among the ordinary stars, or finding a fossil which suddenly opens up to him some wild glimpse into the ancient world; or, on seeing an apple fall from a tree, perceiving why the solar system, and the whole of the boundless heavens, are what they are. ”

“ A rumor continued to circulate through the world, vague, mystical, and romantic, of half discoveries by one and another power; and tales, wilder than anything but pure fiction, were soberly listened to by crowned heads,—all of which went to confirm the belief in the hoped-for straits, which one pretender to discovery even went so far as to name, and give latitude and longitude. ”

“ The discovery of the truth will be of great advantage to navigation, in giving a knowledge of the true latitude and longitude of places, ports, and capes discovered, or which may be discovered in various voyages. ”

“ After an interval of more than five-and-thirty years the voyage of the Beagle has been followed by the voyage of the Challenger, furnished with all the newest appliances of science, and manned by a scientific staff more than competent to turn them to the best account. And what is one of the many results that have been added to our knowledge of Nature—to our estimate of the true character and history of the globe we live on? It is that Darwin's theory is a dream. ”

“ On the wings of these books, we can fly to the corners of the earth,— penetrate the crust of the globe, and move through the ground faster than a mole or the Ghost in "Hamlet,"—dive into the ocean and explore its depths—or, like the fairy, "put a girdle round the earth in forty nunutes;" and when we have measured and weighed this orb, we can mount to the stars, and range the universe. Here, geography, geology, botany, zoölogy, astronomy, may bring forth to us their treasures, and enable us, in this small room, to traverse the world. ”

“ One after another the great nations of the world have taken up the task, until to-day the volume of scientific travel is immense. Darwin's famous voyage in the Beagle, [12] and Wallace's years of travel in the East Indies have revolutionized much of the science of our times, and show how great may be the outcome of travel when directed toward a purely ideal end. As part and parcel of this growth of science as an inspiration to travel, we have the splendid records of the search for the Poles. ”

“ God has been favourable to my inclination, and has given me the spirit of understanding, so that I have become very skilful in navigation, with a competent knowledge in arithmetic, geometry, and astronomy, and both genius and skill to draw maps and charts of this world, with its cities, rivers, islands, and ports, all in their proper places and proportions. During my whole life, I have endeavoured to see and understand all books of cosmography, history, and philosophy ”

“ And the Ocean, though its limits were widened in men’s imaginations, was very far from being mapped and fenced around with definite boundaries. Years of exploration still lay ahead; and many a valiant explorer had to fall a martyr in the cause of Science, before mystery should yield to knowledge. ”

“ Numerous scientific voyages and expeditions for the exploration of unknown lands and seas, partly in earlier centuries, but more especially in the nineteenth, have brought to light an undreamed abundance of new organic forms. ”

“ Admitting, however, that we may have expressed too sanguine expectations of commercial advantages, either within our own reach, or gradually to be unfolded at some future period, as the result of our voyages of discovery, we may still be allowed, to consider them as a laudable effort to add to the stock of human knowledge, with regard to an object which cannot but deserve the attention of enlightened man. ”

“ It requires some zeal in the pursuit of scientific lore to leave the glowing fire and the pleasant book, the luxurious arm-chair and the elastic carpet, and to venture down to the wild sea-beach, to poke and peer among the desolate rocks. Yet even now we may find a few bright days, when Nature abroad looks inviting, and when an hour’s marine research will prove neither unpleasant nor unsuccessful. ”

“ In most of the Wonder Voyages represented in this volume there are traces of the influence of the last voyage of man. In the Greek, in the Celtic, and in the Norse voyages there is a clear reference, as will be seen from the Notes, to the other world as the bourne from which our travelers do return: in fact, we have here the free play of the Folk-mind on man's last home. The travelers cross the bar and sail out into the Unknown ”

“ Though some have gone there are enough left to rally round and form a nucleus for the next Expedition, when troublous times are over and scientific exploration can once more be legitimately undertaken. ”

“ But the interesting adventures which he experienced, and the interesting style in which he told them, aroused universal attention, which was perhaps increased by the fact that his journey was undertaken purely from love of adventure and discovery. ”

“ He has behind him the powerful support of a deep, delightful mystery. He it is who "takes the sun" at noon, and finds out the ship's path at sea. And in truth, regarded merely as a scientific experiment, the guiding of a vessel across the unmarked trackless ocean has few equals within the whole range of human knowledge. ”

“ In point of dismal fact that voyage is made upon an uncharted sea. A few plain general instructions in the principles of navigation are all we get; we have to look out for the rocks and shoals and whirlpools and adverse currents for ourselves. ”

“ Just as the navigator follows the coast of a continent, verifying all the lights one after another; so, midway between horizons, the astronomer standing on the moving earth, like a mariner on his bridge, calculates the exact hour with his eyes on the most complete sextant of all. ”

“ In old books of voyages we find many more wonders than in those of later date, not because the course of nature is at all changed, but because nature was not then so well understood. A thousand things were prodigious a century ago, which are not now at all strange. ”

“ The body of mere travellers who now hurry over the globe on the wings of steam, would be converted into valuable pioneers for the yet unexplored wastes of geology, could they be made to see and feel the power which is possessed by every voyager to contribute, though not so abundantly as the prince of travellers, Humboldt, to the stores of natural science. ”

“ Could we but voyage back in time as we can sail forward in space, we should find each of the geological formations not less - 185 - clearly defined than are the different nations and countries of the present day. ”

“ The principal object of my expedition was scientific. I desired to examine the geography, natural history, and statistics of that country, by taking directions on the road with the compass, and by determining the principal points by astronomical observations. I made a rich collection of quite new and undescribed plants. ”

“ A ruder and more practical direction in which the spirit of the age manifested itself conspicuously and with prodigious results was that of exploring navigation, to penetrate the unknown regions of the globe and find their secrets out. ”

“ In giving a short and rapid sketch of the progress of discovery, so far as it has been accomplished by land expeditions during the period alluded to, we are naturally led to divide what we have to say according to the three great portions of the globe which have been the objects of these expeditions, viz. ”