180 ACCOUNT OF THE ARCTIC UEGIONS. 



miles square be so great, what must be the amount 

 requisite for the discolouration of the sea, through 

 an extent of perhaps twenty or thirty thousand 

 square miles? 



These animals are not without their evident eco- 

 nomy, as on their existence possibly depends the be- 

 ing of the whole race of mysticete, and some other 

 species of cetaceous animals. For, the minute me- 

 dusae apparently afford nourishment to the sepiae, 

 actiniae, cancri, helices, and other genera of Mollusca 

 and Aptera, so abundant in the Greenland Sea, 

 while these latter constitute the food of several of the 

 whale tribe inhabiting the same region ; thus pro- 

 ducing a dependant chain of animal life, one parti- 

 cular link of which being destroyed, the whole must 

 necessarily perish. 



Besides the minute medusae and moniliform sub- 

 stances, the water of the Spitzbergen Sea, taken up in 

 latitude 77° 30', was found to contain several species 

 of animalcules. Of these I discovered three kinds, 

 full of animal life, but invisible to the naked eye. 



There can be no doubt, I think, after what has 

 been advanced, that the medusae and other minute 

 animals that have been described, give the peculiar 

 colour to the sea, which is observed to prevail in 

 these parts ; and that from their profusion, they are, 

 at the same time, the occasion of that great diminu- 

 tion of transparency which always accompanies 

 the olive-green colour. For in the blue water. 



