36 JOHAN HJORT. N.-M. Kl. 



Depth of 150 mètres = 6.9 ° = 34-20 per thousand. 

 _ 190 — = 7.1 = 34.47 _ 



During the past Winter in the North, cold temperatures were met 

 with only in the upper layers of water, when the temperature was ob- 

 served so low as 1.50 Celsius. This low temperature would, in the 

 South, in ordinary years correspond to water of the salineness of the 

 Baltic Current. This was, therefore, not the case in the North during the 

 present Winter. To what extent, however, the cause of this lies in the 

 cold layers in the North possessing, invariably, a larger amount of 

 saline contents than those in the South, can hardly be arrived at on the 

 basis of the materials to hand at present. As before mentioned, the 

 past Winter was excessively cold. In the tables will be found a report 

 on the temperature of the air in the Lofotens, from the 20th January 

 to the 20th March, from which it will be seen that the temperature is 

 almost always below freezing point, and even fell to — 10° Celsius. It 

 may, therefore, be assumed that the low temperatures were due to cool- 

 ling from the atmosphere, all the more so indeed, because they were * 

 only met with in the upper layers and not at any great depth. 



Notwithstanding that the difference in salinenes from the surface to 

 a depth of from 200 to 300 mètres was not great (i — 2 per 1000), this 

 difference shews us, nevertheless, that fresh (cold) water continually re- 

 plenished the upper layers. The earlier temperature-measurements have, 

 however, proved, that the cold layers would descend to a depth of from 

 60 to 100 fathoms. 



Future investigations must then decide the important question 

 whether, in such years these thick cold layers are fresher than the 

 warmer ones, and whence the cold layers have their origin. 



The probability is, according to my opinion and from what I have 

 been able to find out from seamen and fishermen concerning the drift 

 of the currents in the North), that the Baltic Current continues to flow 

 Northward too, along the shores of Nordland, but that its salineness is 

 increased by mixing, the further North it proceeds, so that the current 

 there is of a salineness corresponding to that of the layers zvhich flow 

 up the Skagerak. This can only be decided when the Coastal Waters 

 in the North have been systematically investigated during the various 

 seasons of the year. 



