TO BIRKELAND. THE NORWEGIAN AURORA POLARIS EXPEDITION, 19021903. 



GUNNAR KNUDSEN, J. FABRICIUS, a landed proprietor, and A. SCHIBSTED, editor of the "Aftenposten" then 

 contributed 6000 krones each; and the remainder, which amounted to about 30,000 krones, I have fur- 

 nished myself. 



It may safely be said that economy is one of the virtues of Norwegians as a nation, perhaps one 

 may say a virtue of necessity; but the nation's idealism often turns the balance in delightful non-comfor- 

 mity with economy. The grants to my aurora expeditions are an instance of this. I will take this 

 opportunity of offering my respectful thanks to the government authorities, the scientific institutions, and 

 the private men who have given their support to these undertakings. 



The preparations for the expedition were pushed on with the greatest energy for a year, and in 

 this I was ably assisted by my assistant of the 2nd expedition, Hr. S. Saeland. After a search in the 

 four lands mentioned above, for the purpose of finding suitable dwelling-houses with as easy access from 

 Christiania as possible, I fixed upon the following as my four stations: Kaafjord in Finmark, Dyrafjord 

 in Iceland, Axeleen in Spitsbergen, and Matotchkin Schar in Novaja Semlja. 



The expedition was ready to start about the 1st July, 1902. 



F 



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THE AURORAL STATION IN KAAFJORD. 



4. This station was in the province of Finmark, close to the Kaafjord Copper Mines, in 6956'N. 

 Lat. and 22 58' E. Long. 



The members of the expedition were RICH. KREKLING, a science graduate, and O. EGEN^S, an engineer. 

 The station was under my special supervision; during my absence it was managed by Krelding. 



Sseland, Krekling and Egenaes set out for Kaafjord with their equipment on the zoth July, 1902, 

 and arrived at their destination on the I7th. 



The first investigations that were made here during this expedition were simultaneous registerings 

 of the terrestrial-magnetic components, with two exactly similar sets of registering apparatuses. The 



one set was placed in the mountain 

 observatory on Talviktop, the other 

 in a mine, 100 metres in under 

 the mountain. Saeland registered in 

 the mine, while the other two men 

 worked at the summit from the 26th 

 July to the 15th August. 



The second series of investiga- 

 tions comprised magnetic and earth- 

 current observations, and in the 

 next place meteorological and at- 

 mospheric-electric measures. These 

 were made in Kaafjord during the 

 period from the i8th August, 1902, 

 to the 1 3th March, 1903. 



The third series of investiga- 



Fig. 10. The Kaafjord Station. tions - magnetic and earth-current 



registering, was made, for reasons 



given below, at Bossekop, during the period from the 15th March to the ist April, near the locality of 

 the polar station in 1882 and 1883. 



