IX.] 



LJACHOFFS ISLAND. 



317 



Idothea cntomon, of which Dr. Stuxberg counted 800 specimens 

 from a single sweep of the dredge. There were obtained at the 

 same time, besides a few specimens of Idothea Sahinei, sponges 

 and bryozoa in great abundance, and small mussels, Crustacea, 

 vermes, &c. Various fishes were also caught, and some small 

 alg£e collected. The trawl-net besides brought up from the 

 bottom some fragments of mammoth tusks, and a large number 

 of pieces of wood, for the most part sticks or branches, which 

 appear to have stood upright in the clay, to judge from the fact 

 that one of their ends was often covered with living bryozoa. 

 These sticks often caused great inconvenience to the dredgers, 

 by tearing the net that was being dragged along the bottom. 



ljachoff's island. 

 After a drawing by O. Nordquist. 



On the night preceding the 31st of August, as we steamed 

 past Svjatoinos, a peculiar phenomenon was observed. . The sky 

 was clear in the zenith and in the east ; in the west, on the other 

 hand, there was a bluish-grey bank of cloud. The temperature 

 of the water near the surface varied between + 1° and + 1°"6, 

 that of the air on the vessel between + l°-o and + 1°'8. Although 

 thus both the air and the water had a temperature somewhat 

 above the freezing-point, ice was seen to form on the calm, 

 mirror-bright surface of the sea. This ice consisted partly of 

 needles, partly of a thin sheet. I have previously on several 

 occasions observed in the Arctic seas a similar phenomenon, 

 that is to sav, have observed the formation of ice when the 



