FRIDTJOF NANSEN. [norw. pol. exp. 



were Infusoria, but numerous smaller organisms of great mobility belonging 

 to the Flagellata or similar groups, were also observed and studied. In nearlv 

 all samples of these brownish accumulations I also very frequently observed 

 a comparatively big bassilum, of a simple rodlike appearance, rapidly oscilla- 

 ting, and often forming long chains. 



The brown spots on the bottom of the ponds (Fig. A, f) and on the ice-foot 

 (Fig. A, e) grew gradually larger from day to day; but owing to their dark 

 brownish colour they absorbed more heat from the sun than the surrounding 



white ice, and then the ice under them was more 

 rapidly melted away, and they sank deeper and 

 deeper into the ice, and formed small cylindrical 

 holes (Fig. B) often several inches deep and perhaps 



an inch or more in diameter, with very sharp 

 Fig. B. Diagram illustrative 



of the accumulation of algae and square edges. The bottom of these vertical 



in holes on the bottom of , , in -. fii 1 -.i i • 1 



, ., . T holes, was gradually quite tilled with a brownish 



ponds on the ice. a, Ice. ° J » 



b, Fresh-water. c, Holes. mass of diatoms, which could easily be sucked up 



with a glass tube. 



In the channels between the ice-floes, especially in the narrow ones, 

 where there was very little movement in the water, both Dr. Blessing and 

 myself observed in July, 1894, numerous small globular lumps, generally of 

 a reddish colour, or sometimes with a more bleaked whitish colour. These 

 floating lumps grew rapidly larger from day to day; they began as small, 

 hardly visible specks, but eventually attained considerable size, one or two 

 inches in diameter, or even much more. 



In my diary for July 18th, 1894, I find the following remarks about these 

 lumps floating in the channels between the floes: First I mention mucous 

 greenish brown masses composed solely of a brown alga, Melosira 1 , which 

 occurred often in great abundance at a certain depth (of about 1 metre or 

 more) "almost in every small channel, especially the more enclosed ones, and 

 one could see, that on the sides of the ice-floes, at a certain depth, a greenish 

 brown layer spread over the surface of the ice, and far down into the water. 

 It looked as if it was the same alga which here grew on the ice". I then 



1 In 1882 I found quantities of this alga in the stomach of a bear, who seems to eat 

 them as vegetable food. 



