THE ARCTIC PACK 1 35 



draws attention to the power and character of the ice, resembHng the 

 formations in the sounds of the American Arctic Archipelago, and 

 calls it paleocrystic.^^ This term, introduced into science by Nares, 

 was intended by him to designate compact ice formations resembling 

 in size and power fragments of inland or glacier ice but, according to 

 Nares's opinion, actually formed by the heaping up of floating masses 

 of ice of sea origin. Greely controverted this opinion of Nares as to 

 the possibility of the existence of paleocrystic ice in the shape of floe- 

 bergs, considering the latter to be ordinary glacier ice,^^ but I think 

 there are no grounds for denying the existence of the forms of ics 

 described by Nares and confirmed by De Long's observations. During 

 my expedition to Bennett Island in 1903 I observed ice near this 

 island which perfectly corresponded to De Long's descriptions. 



Observing the results of shock in the autumn ice of the Siberian 

 Sea in the form of many-years-old grounded hummocks [Russian, 

 stamukhi] 60 to 80 feet thick, one may assume that the shock of the ice 

 fields of the pack is capable of producing much greater effects and 

 forming many-years-old heaped-up masses not only out of the thin 

 ice 2 to 3 feet thick but out of old fields 12 to 14 feet thick. A float- 

 ing mass of ice 30 feet high above sea level, such as reported by Nan- 

 sen and Weyprecht, may have vertical dimensions up to 200 feet; 

 such a many-years-old formation, being transported to a shallow 

 place, will look like a paleocrystic floeberg. Near the southern coast 

 of Bennett Island I observed quite compact masses of ice of undoubt- 

 edly heaped-up formation grounded at depths of 9 to 10 fathoms and 

 having vertical dimensions up to 80 feet over all. Peary (denying, 

 however, the existence of paleocrystic floebergs and considering them 

 to be parts of glaciers) had occasion to observe grounded hummocks up 

 to 100 feet high and more formed by the shock of the pack near Cape 

 Washington at the northern end of Greenland. He also mentions a 

 hill 50 feet high on an old ice field. ^^ As to the average thickness of 

 the heaped-up many-years-old fields of the Arctic Pack one may 

 assume it to amount to as much as 100 feet, in keeping with Hall's 

 testimony, who met such fields during the Polaris expedition of 1860- 

 186 1 near Smith Sound. Simpson^^ mentions a case near the north 

 coast of Alaska where a many-years-old field that projected only a few 

 feet above the water grounded on a shoal and through the pressure 

 of the pack rose up to the height of the foreyard of a near-by bark, 

 i.e. 40 to 45 feet. My measurements and observations showed thick- 

 ly Emma De Long, edit.: The Voyage of the Jeannette: The Ship and Ice Journals of George W. 

 De Long, 2 vols., Boston, 1897, p. 614 (in Vol. 2). 



1= A. W. Greely: Three Years of Arctic Service: An Account of the Lady Franklin Bay Expedition 

 of 1881-84 and the Attainment of the Farthest North, 2 vols.. New York, 1886; reference in Vol. 2, 

 Chapter 33 (Polar Ice), pp. 43-60. 

 1^ Peary, op. cit. 

 " Simpson, op. cit., p. 6. 



