NORDENSKJOLD'S AND BERGGREN'S JOURNEY IN 1870. 19 



little as it is, together with the powder and certain other micro- 

 scopic organisms by which it is accompanied, is the most dangerous 

 enemy to the mass of ice, so many thousand feet in height, and 

 hundreds of miles in extent. The dark mass absorbs a far greater 

 amount of the sun's ra}-s of heat than the white ice, and thus pro- 

 duces over its whole surface deep holes which greatly promote 

 the process of melting. The same plant has no doubt played the 

 same part in our country, and we have to thank it, perhaps, that 

 the deserts of ice which formerly covered the whole of northern 

 Europe and America, have now given place to shady woods and 

 undulating corn-fields. Of course a great deal of the grey powder 

 is carried down in the rivers, and the blue ice at the bottom of 

 them is not unfrequently concealed by a dark dust. How rich 

 this mass is in organic matter is proved by the circumstance, 

 amongst others, that the quantity of organic in it was sufficient 

 to bring a large collection of the grey powder, which had been 

 carried away to a distant part of the ice by sundry now dried-up 

 glacier streams, into so strong a process of fermentation or putre- 

 faction, that the mass, even at a great distance, emitted a most dis- 

 agreeable smell, like' that of butyric acid." Dr. Berggren has 

 described these organisms in the ' Ofv. Kongl. Vet.-Akademiens 

 Forh.' for 1871, p. 293, under the name of Ancylonema Nordenskidldii 

 Berggr. Protococcus nivalis is also common, as well as P. vulgaris 

 and Scytomena gracilis. 



"At our midday rest on the 21st we had reached lat. 68° 21' and 

 36' long, east of the place where our tent was pitched, and a height 

 of 1 400 feet above the level of the sea. Later in the day, at our 

 afternoon rest, the Greenlanders take to take off their boots and 

 examine their little thin feet — a serious indication, as we soon 

 perceived. Isak presently informed us, in broken Danish, that he 

 and his companions now considered it time to return. All attempts 

 to persuade them to accompany us a little farther failed, and we 

 had, therefore, no other alternative than to let them return, and 

 continue our excursion without them. We took up our night's 

 quarters here. The provisions were divided. The Greenlanders, 

 considering that they might perhaps not be able to find our first 

 depot, were allowed to take as much as was necessary to enablo 

 them to reach the tent. We took out cold provisions for five days. 

 The remainder, together with the excellent photogen portable 

 kitchen, which we had hitherto carried with us, were laid up in ;i 

 depot in the neighbourhood, on which a piece of tarpaulin was 

 stretched upon sticks, that we might be aide t<> find the place on 

 our return, which, however, we did not succeed in doing, though 



o 2 



