CHAPTER I.

Various routes between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans described--Advantages of a North-West Passage, if practicable--What is to be gained from further Arctic exploration--What zoology would gain--The problem of the migration of birds--About the Knots--Boundaries of the North Polar Regions--Their principal geographical features--Divisions into two zones, or sections--The stony tundras--The flora of the North--The Siberian desert--Limits of perpetual snow--General character of life in the Polar World 9–21