3G4 THE VOYAGE OF THE VEGA. [chap. 



a cold room, that is to say, the cold current of air must go below 

 from the cold room to the warm, the warm above from the warm 

 room to the cold. The mountain heights which, according to 

 the statement of the natives, are to be found in the interior of 

 the Chukch peninsula besides conduce to the heat and dryness, 

 of the southerly and south-easterly winds. For they confer on 

 the sea winds that pass over their summits the properties of 

 the fohn winds. Our coldest winds have come from S.W. to 

 W., that is to say, from the Old World's pole of cold, situated in 

 the region of Werchojansk. On the existence of two currents 

 of air, which at a certain height above the surface of the earth 

 contend for the mastery, depends also the surprising rapidity 

 with which the vault of heaven in the region of Behring's Straits 

 becomes suddenly clouded over and again completely clear. 

 Already the famous Behring's Straits' navigator, Rodgers, now 

 Admiral in the American Navy, had noticed this circumstance, 

 and likened it very strikingly to the drawing up and dropping of 

 the curtain of a theatre. 



In our notes on the weather a difference was always made 

 between snoyixi (fall of snow in wind) and yrsno (snow-storm 

 without snow-fall). The fall of snow was not very great, but as 

 there was in the course of the winter no thaw of such continu- 

 ance that the snow was at any time covered with a coherent 

 melted crust, a considerable portion of the snow that fell re- 

 mained so loose that with the least puff of wind it was whirled 

 backwards and forwards. In a storm or strong breeze the snow 

 was carried to higher strata of the atmosphere, which was 

 speedily filled with so close and fine snow-dust, that objects at 

 the distance of a few metres could no longer be distinguished. 

 There was no possibility in such weather of keeping the way 

 open, and the man that lost his way was helplessly lost, if he 

 could not, like the Chukch snowed up in a drift, await the ceasing 

 of the storm. But even when the wind was slight and the sky 

 clear there ran a stream of snow some centimetres in height 

 along the ground in the direction of the wind, and thus 

 principally from N.W. to S.E. Even this shallow stream heaped 

 snowdrifts everywhere where there was any protection from the 

 wind, and buried more certainly, if less rapidly, than the drifting 

 snow of the storm, exposed objects and trampled footpaths. The 

 quantity of water, which in a frozen form is removed in this 

 certainly not deep, but uninterrupted and rapid current over the 

 north coast of Siberia to more southerly regions, must be equal 

 to the mass of water in the giant rivers of our globe, and play 

 a sufficiently great role, among others as a carrier of cold to 

 the most northerly forest regions, to receive the attention of 

 meteorologists. 



Th^ humidity of the air was observed both by August's 



