1875 DISCOLOURATION OF SEA. 11 



by which time the barometer had fallen to 29'10, the 

 western clouds were remarkably red and windy-looking 

 from near the horizon to 20° in altitude ; the gale was 

 then at its height, blowing with a force of seven. 



On the morning of the 30th the barometer rose 

 quickly; the gale dying out by noon was succeeded 

 by calm and beautiful weather, which enabled us to 

 proceed to the northward under low steam. When 

 fifty miles off the coast north of Frederikshaab, the 

 edge of the pack obliged us to haul out a little farther 

 from the land, and during the following night, when a 

 little south of Fiskenoes, we could not get nearer the 

 shore than fifty miles. Since we had been in the 

 neighbourhood of Cape Farewell, and near the ice the 

 water had changed its colour to a dark olive green, 

 occasioned by the presence of innumerable diatoms ; in 

 the break of the sea during the gale the crest of the 

 waves showed a dingy yellowish green colour. 



The 1st of July was a magnificent day, the barometer 

 high and steady. At 9 a.m., when we were in latitude 

 63° 5' N., at about forty-five miles' distance from land, 

 we appeared to have passed all the shore ice, but there 

 may have been some small unimportant streams close 

 in by the land ; at noon by good observations we were 

 on the west edge of the Torske Bank, off the Groede 

 Fiord of Fiskernoes, thirty-eight miles distant from the 

 land. Expecting to find shallow water we tried for 

 soundings, but did not reach bottom with 130 fathoms 

 of line out, the minimum temperature of the water above 

 that depth being 33°\5 ; at 4 p.m we again failed to 

 reach the bottom with the same quantity of line out ; it 

 is therefore evident that this bank is wrongly placed on 



