SALT-WATER FISHERIES OF NORWAY. 705 



existence, while the sea nearer the coast, especially in tbe most south- 

 erly poFtion examined by us, was swarming with " herring-food." In 

 this we could only see a favorable sign of a possible return of the spring- 

 herring fisheries ; and later reports from the spring-herring district seem 

 to confirm our expectations. Near Jau-Mayen we also observed, every 

 now and then, below the above-mentioned seaslime, great quantities of 

 unusually large "herring-food," besides other animals peculiar to the 

 Polar Sea. 



The sea immediately surrounding Jan-Mayen seems both from a 

 physical and biological point of view to resemble the Western Green- 

 land Sea, and like this it is a genuine glacial sea, which all the year 

 round is subject to the direct influence of the polar current, and even 

 near the surface its temperature is very low, falling to 0° at the depth 

 of a few fathoms. In such water no herring or codfish can live. The 

 "herring- food" here chiefly serves as food for numberless sea-birds, and 

 farther north, also, for the giant of the sea, the Greenland whale. The 

 Northern Ocean, ])roperly so-called, is, on the other hand, a partly tem- 

 perate sea, through the warm Atlantic current, even as far as Spitz- 

 bergen. The waters of the Polar Sea only mingle with it occasionally, 

 bringing with it some of the above-mentioned sea-slime, which here in 

 ■warmer water begins to play the significant part to which we referred 

 above, viz, forming the primary cause of success of one of the most im- 

 portant industries of our country, the salt-water fisheries. 

 45 F 



