On April 14, 1912, the Titanic sank as the result of a collision with an iceberg and a large number of her passengers and crew were drowned. As a direct result of this disaster an International Conference on the Safety of Life at Sea was convened in London. In order to protect transatlantic shipping from dangers of icebergs and field-ice it was clear that it would be necessary to institute a systematic patrol of the North Atlantic. This work was undertaken by the United States Coast Guard who have carried it out most ably under the direction of the International Ice Patrol Board. As at present organised, the patrol is carried out by three vessels. One is an oceanographic vessel fully equipped with a seagoing laboratory which attempts to make one current map per month of the area that appears most critical at the time. The other two are patrol vessels which make cruises of two weeks' duration and relieve one another every fifteen days.

In 1929 Adolf Hoel summarised Norwegian Arctic work in Skrifter om Svalbard og Ishavet, No. 1, “The Norwegian Svalbard Expeditions, 1906–1926”. In the recently issued No. 73 of the same series, “Report on the Activities of the Norges Svalbard-og Ishavs-undersøkelser, 1927–1936” (125 pages, photographs and map), Dr Hoel likewise summarises the work of the following decade. The format of the report is that of the earlier issue with minor modifications, including, besides summaries of the work done year by year, such interesting and miscellaneous information as the finances of the various expeditions sent out, the names of the foreign expeditions that have been helped by the N.S.I.U., and many other kindred topics. In addition there are lists and tables that show in brief a mass of information on surveys and survey methods, the ships used, the papers and maps published and so on. The major part of the new report is devoted to a chronological statement of the expeditions sent out to Svalbard and East Greenland, and of the work at home. The arrangements of the reports on both these regions is similar, and the uninitiated might imagine that the ownership of Svalbard and East Greenland is the same. Each expedition account starts with the name of the ship used and the personnel, then follows a brief narrative of the venture, and finally there is a summary of the work done. The great value of this Skrifter, No. 73, lies in the provision it makes for ready reference. It is equally simple to find out where an individual worker has been and what was his work, what ships have been used and where, what papers and maps have been published and when, as it is to read precisely what a certain expedition was able to do in a particular year.

In the 1938 edition of Hints to Travellers, vol. ii, the editor has produced a handbook on travel rather than a collection of hints, and the general standard is now more comparable with vol. i. The work is the result of the editor's tireless energy and passion for details, combined with a selection of opinions from those who have travelled and explored in most of the relatively unknown parts of the world.