NOTES OF A NATUKALIST ON SPITZBERGEN. 379 



time to roll off the ice. We found birds of the usual species 

 especially abundant off the south shore of the bay. We landed 

 on Axel Island to reconnoitre, and from there obtained a splendid 

 view of the seething masses of ice, as they ground their way out 

 through the gut ; it was a wonderfully beautiful and grand sight. 

 We waited here for about two hours until the tide was slack, when 

 the worst of the commotion in the ice was over and we were able 

 to proceed. Over a great part of these islands the strata of the 

 rocks crop out to the surface in a nearly vertical direction, and 

 are full of fossils, and I filled my pockets with the best specimens 

 that I could obtain without a hammer.* When we had rowed on 

 for some time after leaving Axel Island, we found it impossible — 

 at least during a day's expedition — to arrive at the north shore, 

 in consequence of the compact barrier of ice ; we therefore turned 

 round, and again landed on the islands, on one of which we had 

 a great, though unsuccessful, hunt after some Pink-footed Geese. 

 The corner of the island on which we found the Geese was low- 

 lying and almost entirely covered with moss, partially overgrown 

 by which were numerous ribs and other bones of large Whales — 

 probably the remains of Balcena mysticetus, killed during the old 

 whaling days. On an island to the south of the principal island 

 (and to the best of my recollection on its westerly or south-westerly 

 shore, just where one would most naturally have expected it to 

 be) I picked up a dead Whimbrel — the first and only specimen, 

 I believe, recorded from Spitzbergen. It is little more than the 

 mummy, or dried skin, of the bird, in the state one so often finds 

 birds on the sea-coast, — all the flesh picked off the breast by 

 Gulls or other birds, — and one is naturally inclined to explain its 

 presence by inventing a theory of its having wandered northwards 

 from Lapland or some part of the coast further to the east, or 

 from Iceland further west and south, — perhaps blown off by a 

 southerly gale, and dropping from exhaustion into the sea, a short 

 distance from land, was washed up at the spot where I found it. 

 It might also be suggested that it was killed at some point on the 

 N.W. coast of Scandinavia, and falling at once into the sea was 

 carried all the way to the Gulf-stream ; but a strong objection to 

 this is the question whether so small and delicate an object as a 



* Such fossils as I brought home from Spitzbergen are now in the hands 

 of my friend Mr. E. B. Poulton. F.G.S., who will, I hope, be able shortly to 

 report upon them. 



