December i, 1910] 



NATURE 



^y^ 



against the lower bare ground, with hardly any ' out- 

 wash ' (see Fig. 3). It consists almost entirely of streaky 

 red clay containing a few scratched boulders, and crowded 

 with marine shells, some broken, but mostly perfect and 

 the bivalves united. The clay has evidently been derived in 

 the first place from the red Devonian rocks into which 

 the fiord is cut : but its more immediate origin was the 

 neighbouring sea-bottom, which has undoubtedly been 

 dragged up in some way by the glacier in its advance. 

 The existing remnant of the glacier was seen to be 

 curiously entangled among the clay ; and the presence of 

 -mailer masses of ice buried under the moraine was 

 ndicated by the crater-like hollows of subsidence bj' which 

 ;:s surface was pitted. 



But the story of Cora Island is too long for our space 

 — we must leave it regretfully, in the same mood thai we 

 left it on the late evening of August 7, to hasten back to 

 our ship* On August 8 the /Eolus carefully threaded the 



different temperament ; the Svea, smooth, worn, and re- 

 tiring ; the Wahlenberg, known to have been recently 

 aroused into activity, and jagged, fissured, and tumbling 

 in the rapidity of its advance. On this coast, also, our 

 Director pointed out to us the crumpled structure of the 

 rocky ridges separating the glacier-basins — huge wrinkles 

 on the fringe of the western belt of disturbance. Cross- 

 ing Ice Fiord once more, we found anchorage for the 

 night in Green Bay, but not too near the malodorous 

 whaling station, where the carcases of a dozen unshapely 

 monsters awaited dismemberment. 



On the morning of August 8 we landed on the west 

 shore of Green Bay, and went inland up a transverse valley 

 which cuts the mountainous ridge and very clearly reveals 

 its structure — a steeply dipping succession of Carboniferous, 

 Permian and Trias, with Jurassic on the shores of the 

 bay, and Tertiary, comparatively undisturbed, above the 

 j eastern side. Mist, w^ith a splutter of rain, hung around 



Fig. 2. — Mount Capitolium (2790 feel), Ekmaa Bay. Carboniferous rocks (with underlying Devonian concealed by tains), shoiring frcued form 



developed by weathering. 



inner recesses of Dickson Bay, where her farthest north, 

 "'^^ 5o'> was reached, and where the glowing redness of 



he Devonian rocks — in the distance like heather in bloom 

 —gave warmth to the .Arctic wilderness. Many of us, 



•owever, chose the alternative of a landing under Cape 

 \\ ijk, at the entrance to the fiord, and a long climb up 



he shaly slopes of Permian and richly fossiliferous Trias 



J the plateau at about 2000 feet, formed by an intrusive 

 -ill of diabase. There, in bright sunshine, we gained a 

 view from which not all the promised reptiles of the Trias 

 could drag us — fiords, glaciers, and valley-trenches every- 

 where around ; away in the north-east, snowfields and 

 peaks above the head of VVijde Bay ; and our ship a speck 

 on the blue floor of the nearer recess. Nevertheless, it 

 would be a desolate land to be alone in with no such 

 speck ! 

 That same evening, in going southward, we steamed 



lose in under the ice-clififs of the Svea and Wahlenberg 

 glaciers — contiguous neighbours, but at present of very 



NO. 2144, VOL. 85] 



the peaks all day, but the valley was dr>-. Later, a flving 

 visit was made to the whaling station by those who could 

 face the ordeal ; and in this manner was our programme 

 for Ice Fiord brought to its appointed end. As our ship 

 swung westward into the floes at the mouth of the fiord 

 the evening sunlight glittered on the land, just as it had 

 done at our approaching ; so it chanced that our last view 

 of Spitsbergen was like our first. 



It had been planned that we should visit Hornsund next 

 day in returning southward. But the ice-floes drove us 

 westward even farther than before, and there would have 

 been much risk in pushing landward through them again. 

 Our journey to the lonely island was done. So, after a 

 few hours of devious sailing, we emerged from the tangle 

 into the open ocean, and there rolled uncomfortably south- 

 ward under a cold thick sky for the next two days, gain- 

 ing the welcome shelter of the Norwegian coast on the 

 morning of August 12. It was on the previous night; that 

 we had reached into sunset again. 



