90 NOT IN SITU. 



sea until it gets within tlie influence of the polar 

 current, or of some storm, which drives it on the 

 coasts of Spitzhergen. It has heen suggested 

 to me that this wood might possibly be in situ^ 

 i. e. might have composed part of great forests 

 at one time growing in Spitzhergen itself ; but 

 although I do not at all wish to give any 

 opinion upon the very doubtful and debatable 

 subject of whether or not there once existed a 

 milder climate in the Arctic regions, still I 

 think there are strong reasons for believing 

 that this wood is not in situ, because — 



1. Nineteen-twentieths at least of the visible 

 wood in Spitzhergen lies actually on the shore, 

 just above the reach of the waves. 



2. A great quantity of it is on the Thousand 

 Islands, and other outlying reefs and skerries, 

 which are composed entirely of bare trap rocks 

 without a particle of soil, and which could not, 

 in their present state of barrenness, have borne 

 trees even in a temperate climate. 



3. It is all much water- worn, as if from long 

 exposure in the sea and rolling on the beach ; 

 also a great deal of it is worm-eaten, and I do 

 not believe that worms that bore Avood exist in 

 Spitzhergen: even the wood found here and 



