December i, 19 io] 



NATURE 



153 



current, until we had been shouldered off 70 or 80 miles 

 to the westward of Spitsbergen. On August 2, however, 

 we got an easterly course, picking our way across the 

 ice-streams where they were thinnest, and by evening the 

 lead showed that we were approaching land. So we lay 

 to, in a light haze, to await clear weather. 



Soon, very gently, the haze thinned away ; the northern 

 sun shimmered again over the smooth olive sea, burnishing 

 the floes into silver ; and then, gradually, an exquisite 

 panorama of peaks and glaciers was unveiled in front of 

 us, lengthening northward and southward into a far per- 

 spective, and we knew that this was Spits-bergen, and 

 worthy of its name. Due north of us rose the angular 

 ridges of Prince Charles Foreland, and right ahead lay 

 the gap of our haven. Ice Fiord ; so we moved quietly for- 

 ward, through a scene of dreamy splendour, to our 

 anchorage after midnight in Safe Bay. Surely never was 

 there a more impressive revelation of this sflent land ! 



From this time onw^ard our days were busy days, 

 thionged with scientific interests and impressions that 

 shifted all too rapidlv. Within the great Ice Fiord, which 



Fig. 1. 



-Index-map of Ice Fiord, Spitsbergen. The course of the ss. Molus is shown approximately 

 by the dotted hne. 



runs for 60 miles eastward, crossing the strike of the 

 rocks and almost bisecting the island, we found open 

 water, and our ship was able to pass into all its branches 

 without impediment. During the ensuing week we pene- 

 trated most of its recesses, landing at the best points for 

 investigating its several formations, and gaining a clear 

 idea of their structures from the barren craggy outcrops 

 f'^at rose high above all the waterways. (See Fig. i.) 

 1 hough complex in detail, the geology of central Spits- 

 igen is simple in its main outlines. Earth-movements 

 of intensity, repeated at intervals down to Tertiarv times, 

 have ridged up the western margin of the island, iaringing 

 to light the oldest rocks and crumpling them along with 

 the newer formations. These earth-waves, with their 

 faults, folds and overthrusts, subside eastward, leaving a 

 high plateau of regular stratigraphy and gentle dips, which 



The high jagged outer ridge, at the entranc3 to Ice Fiord, 

 consists of crumpled Heklahoek rocks, succeeded eastward 

 in the next ridges by sharply folded and broken Carbon- 

 iferous strata. But in the interior, the long northern 

 branches of the fiord reveal a great mass of red Devcnian 

 rocks, very similar to our British Devonian, upon which 

 the Carboniferous strata rest with strong unconformity and 

 overlap. In upward succession, the Carboniferous lime- 

 stones and cherts are followed by a belt of sandstones and 

 shales, to which, on the somewhat scanty fossil evidence, 

 a Permian age is assigned ; and above these come the 

 Triassic strata, chiefly shales or clays, with thin lime- 

 stones, sandstones, and phosphate-bands, often rich in well- 

 preserved marine fossils. The outcrops of the three last- 

 mentioned formations are narrowed to strips in the outer 

 folded belt, but expand into wide tracts around the interior 

 fiord. Then follow thick masses of the Jurassic and 

 Tertiary sediments, for the most part gently dipping and 

 in apparent, but unreal, conformity, which build up the 

 high picturesque plateaus on the south side of the inner 

 fiord. These consist mainly of sandstones and shales of 

 fresh-water or estuarine origin, but 

 with occasional bands containing 

 marine fossils. Both formations 

 yield abundant well-developed plant- 

 remains, in striking contrast with 

 the present diminutive Arctic flora ; 

 and both include coal-seams, at least 

 one of which, in the Tertiary rocks, 

 is likely to be of economic conse- 

 quence. 



To resume the recital of our 

 doings in this land. We were astir 

 early on the morning of August 3, 

 anxious to take our first steps ini 

 Spitsbergen, and before breakfast 

 many of us were ashore among the 

 mixture of rocks, moraines, glaciers 

 and raised beaches that forms the 

 west shore of Safe Bay. Leaving 

 this anchorage at breakfast time, our 

 ship went east across Ice Fiord and 

 ran close in under the bold pre- 

 cipices of Jurassic and Tertiary 

 rocks bounding the plateau around 

 Mount Nordenskiold, until Advent 

 Bay was reached, before noon. 

 This has recently become a place of 

 permanent habitation — the only one 

 in the ownerless land. Most of us 

 were surprised at the display of 

 engineering activity in such a re- 

 mote corner, brought about by 

 American enterprise in the develop- 

 ment of a mine in the Tertiary coal. 

 A shipping wharf has been erected, 

 to which the coal is brought from 

 the mine high up on the hill-side by 

 skips travelling overhead on a cable. 

 At the mine, which we visited later, 

 a seam of good quality, 4 feet thick, 

 is worked by means of an adit. It was singular to see 

 the walls of the workings all thickly encrusted with a 

 sparkling layer of hoar-frost from the condensation of 

 moisture on rock-surfaces that are permanently below 

 freezing point. .\ pure white coal-mine ! 



For the afternoon in Advent Bay we divided into two 

 parties. Those who wished to study the Jurassic plant- 

 beds crossed with the ship to the north-east side of the 

 inlet under the guidance of our Director. The rest of us 

 landed at the wharf and went inland towards Mt. Nordens- 

 kiold, led by Mr. B. Hogbom, who had been already for 

 some weeks in the island on geological work under 

 Prof. De Geer's instructions, and who here awaited us. 

 With him we went to the glacier-filled head of the valley 

 south of the coal-mine and ascended the plateau on the 

 westward to an upper moraine where Tertiary plant-fossils 

 occurred in profusion. On this moraine, at an elevation 



is sharply trenched by the branching fiord and its tribu 



tary valleys. On the north side of the fiord most of the j of about 1500 feet, most of us were content to stay, bask- 



valleys contain glaciers which reach the sea; but on the i ing in the sunshine and enjoying the glorious view over 



j south side, owing to difference of aspect and other causes, 

 jthe land-valleys are often empty nearly to their heads. 



NO. 2144, VOL. 85''i 



fiords, plateaus, and snow-fields ; but certain of the more 

 energetic elder mem.bers of our party continued upward 



