GEOGRAPHICAL PROGRESS AND DISCOVERY. 



323 



G 



GEOGRAPHICAL PROGRESS AND DIS- 

 COVERY. The year has been an unsuccessful 

 one for explorers. Several of the numerous 

 expeditions which have ventured into the un- 

 known parts of Africa have succumbed to the 

 triple dangers of those fatal regions. The fate 

 of the German expedition to the west coast of 

 Africa, and the mishaps which have befallen 

 the Marquia Antinori's enterprise, are new 

 illustrations of the rule that the nearly invari- 

 able record of expeditions sent out for definite 

 purposes, and equipped by wealthy associa- 

 tions, is one of disappointment and disaster. 

 The only brilliant discovery to chronicle is the 

 identification by Stanley of the Congo with the 

 Lualaba; this was first theoretically affirmed 

 five years ago. The barbaric countries which 

 Antinori and Largeau are endeavoring to pen- 

 etrate will probably remain closed to inter- 

 course, by the ferocity and fanaticism of their 

 inhabitants, long after a highroad of commerce 

 shall have been opened through the lands of 

 the cannibal savages who harassed Stanley's 

 inarch and hourly menaced his life. The 

 knowledge of the great natural resources of 

 inner Africa will, no doubt, cause in time the 

 replacement of the inhuman slave system by a 

 rational method of commercial intercourse. 

 The aggressions and subjugations effected by 

 Russia in Central Asia, in the name of civiliza- 

 tion, have benefited science, in opening up to 

 investigation regions of high interest to the 

 ethnologist and to the physical geographer. 

 There is reason to expect that Weyprecht's 

 notion of Arctic stations for simultaneous ob- 

 servations will be realized, not through official 

 organization, but through the solidarity which 

 is customary among scientific investigators. 

 The first results of this method of research 

 will probably be collected by Lieutenant Weyp- 

 recht himself, and the Howgate Polar Colony. 



The Norwegian deep-sea sounding expedi- 

 tion continued its hydrographical researches 

 during the summer of 1877 in the same vessel, 

 the Voringen, under Captain Wille, with Pro- 

 fessor Mohn as naturalist. They sailed from 

 TromsS on the 14th of July, and first took three 

 cross-sections of soundings off FuglS, latitude 

 71, with a greatest depth at the northeast limit 

 of a submarine bay, which abuts on the steep 

 bank outside Vesteraalen and Loffoden. They 

 next sailed to Jan Mayen. The transition from 

 the Gulf Stream to the Polar current was 

 found to be exceedingly abrupt. In the chart of 

 Jan Mayen, following the surveys of Zorgdrager 

 and Scoresby, the only inaccuracy of impor- 

 tance is that the island is placed by half a degree 

 of longitude too far to the east. The height 

 of the Beerenberg was found to be 5,836 

 feet. They sounded in 1,032 fathoms, seven 

 miles northwest of the island. The expedition 



returned to Bergen on August 23d. The pro- 

 gramme for 1878 is to examine the region be- 

 tween North Cape, Jan Mayen, and to the north 

 of Spitzbergen, with, perhaps, a trip eastward 

 toward Nova Zembla, in order to determine 

 the isothermal line of at the bottom, which 

 is taken to be the limit of the codfish. 



The curious phenomenon which has been ob- 

 served, that the minimum of temperature is found 

 at a certain depth below the surface, while the 

 water at the bottom is again warmer as, for 

 instance, in the outer part of the West Fiord, 

 where the surface temperature is 45.7, in 60 

 fathoms depth 38.8, and in 140 fathoms, 10 

 fathoms from the bottom, 41 is ascribed to 

 the action of the winter cold upon the water ; 

 the water is chilled at the surface in winter 

 and sinks, this action ceasing when warm 

 weather comes, and the surface waters are 

 warmed and rendered lighter. This phenom- 

 enon is observable all along the coast, and 

 can be detected with Negretti and Zambra's 

 deep-sea thermometer. The deepest sounding 

 was in 1,710 fathoms off Vesteraalen, latitude 

 70, longitude 6 15' E. At this depth ani- 

 mal life is scarce. A specimen of the Umibel- 

 lularia has been taken. The boundary line 

 between a bottom temperature above and one 

 below 32 lies, between latitude 65 and the 1 . 

 Arctic Circle, as far west as 530'E.; beyond 1 

 the Arctic Circle there is a curvature toward 

 the coast; farther north it is only 5 to 10 

 geographical miles off the coast of the islands 

 of Loffoden and Vesteraalen. Here the north- 

 ern edge of the bank is very steep, and falls 

 rapidly toward the deep part of the Arctic 

 Ocean. Out at sea the isothermal plane of 82 

 is found at very different depths in different 

 latitudes: in the channel between Faroe and 

 Shetland, in 800 fathoms ; between Iceland and 

 Norway, 400 fathoms; between Jan Mayen 

 and Norway, 580 fathoms, rising again to the 

 westward. Near the coast the level of 32 is 

 considerably higher. 



Lieutenant^ Weyprecht and Count Wilczek 

 intend undertaking an Arctic expedition, and 

 contemplate an absence of about twelve months. 

 They will establish their station for observa- 

 tions in one of the northern havens of Nova 

 Zembla. They recommend establishing half a 

 dozen other stations for comparative observa- 

 tions at points around the North Pole, not 

 difficult of approach, between latitude 71 and 

 80 N., as on Spitzbergen ; on one of the new 

 Siberian islands near the mouth of the Lena ; 

 at Magnire's wintering station near Point Bar- 

 row ; at UpernavSk in West Greenland ; and on 

 the west coast of Greenland, with a subsidiary 

 station in Norwegian Finmark. It would be 

 also of the highest importance to establish sta- 

 tions, or at least one, near the South Pole for 



