ICI 2. No. 12. 



THE SEA WEST OF SPITSBERGEN. 



39 



According to the corrected values in the lower line of this table, the 

 current in 1878 was 0.68^^ C, in 1899 0.58'^ C. lower than in 1910, while 

 in 1905 it should have been 0.40° C. and in 1896 0.12'' C. warmer than 

 in 1910. 



The following table gives the mean temperatures at four stations in 

 the northernmost region of the Spitsbergen Atlantic Current where it 

 runs over the submarine ridge into the North Polar Basin. As the depth 

 at the Belgica Station iia was only 310 metres, a probable temperature 

 had to be assumed for 400 metres, in accordance with the various vertical 

 temperature-curves (see Fig. 32). 



hl 1878 the current should accordingly have been 0.15^ C, and in 

 1899 0.69'^ C. colder than in 1910, while in 1898 it should have been 

 0.03*^ C. and in 1905 0.35'^ C. warmer than in 1910. But nothing certain 

 can be concluded in this respect from observations from single stations in 

 a region where the sea is so shallow, and where the waters difter so much 

 within short distances. 



In the following table we have computed the means of the above 

 anal3'ses of the temperatures of the Spitsbergen Atlantic Current in dif- 

 ferent 3-ears. All mean temperatures have been referred to the corrected 

 mean temperature of the current in the same region in 1910. Where the 

 mean temperature for one year was lower than that of 19 10, the difference 

 is given in the table with the minus sign ; where it was higher, the diffe- 

 rence is marked with plus. 



As there is such a great distance between the most southern and the 

 most northern stations that we have examined, we cannot consider the 

 water examined in the same summer in these widely-separated regions as 

 water of quite the same year. The water examined in Isachsen's Sect. \'I, 

 for instance, has evidently come through the Færoe-Shetland Channel into 

 the Norwegian Sea long before the water examined in Sect. I. We have 

 therefore divided the area examined into a southern region of Isachsen's 

 Sections I and II, and a northern region of Isachsen's Sections I\' and \'L 



