70 NORDENSKJOLD ON FJORDS. 



in some way, a result of glacial action : it can scarcely be doubted 

 that this is equally true of fjords, and the coasts I have mentioned are 

 those on which glacial action must necessarily be the most energetic ; 

 because west coasts in high latitudes are exposed to west winds 

 (Maury's ' countertrades'), which deposit on the mountains in snow 

 the moisture they have taken up from the sea." 



7. Nordcnskjold on Fjords. — There is no scientific man living better 

 acquainted with the varied phenomena of Arctic ice-action and 

 Physical Geography than Professor Nordenskjold, and these are 

 his words, speaking of the Greenland shore ■} — " The deep fjords 

 evidently scooped out by glaciers." 



I do not pit these authorities against the opponents of the glacier- 

 bed theory of fjords; but only to show that, in supposing that 

 glaciers and fjords have an intimate connection, I am not alone, as 

 might be supposed from merely reading the arguments brought 

 against my paper in this Society's ' Journal.' 



9. The Northern Termination of Greenland. 



What will be found to be the northern termination of Greenland 

 is one of those geographical problems which, like the more trivial 

 question of " What songs the Sirens sang," though a subject of legi- 

 timate speculation, is yet at the same time a matter which can 

 only be settled by an Expedition like the one now preparing. Dr. 

 Petermann has hazarded the opinion that Greenland stretches across 

 the Pole and joins Wrangel Land north of Behring Strait. Without 

 being able to express any decided opinion pro or con., this hypo- 

 thesis of the illustrious German geographer, except that it is just 

 as reasonable as any other — but not more so — and as ingenious as is 

 everything which emanates from the mind of my excellent friend, I 

 think that recent discoveries point to the northern termination being 

 somewhat different. Most likely it will be found that Greenland 

 will end in a broken series of islands forming a Polar archipelago. 

 That the continent (?) is itself a series of such islands and islets — 

 consolidated by means of the inland ice — I have already shown 

 to be highly probable, if not absolutely certain, as Giesecke and 

 Scoresby affirmed (p. 25). It is not likely that the northern portion 

 will be widely different. 



The farthest view we have as yet had of it points to a group of 

 broken islets. The open sea, or sea at least without any continuous 



1 ' Kedogijrelse for en Expedition till Gronland, Ar 1870' (Oversigt af K. 

 Vet.-Akad'. Forh. 1870, No. 10), and trans. ' Geol. Magazine, 1872,' p. 301. 



