498 MR. A. NEWTON ON THE ZOOLOGY OF SPITSBERGEN. [ Noy. 8, 
the other members of our party, to fall in with the Swedish Scientific 
Expedition, who are engaged in making a series of preliminary sur- 
veys, preparatory to measuring an are of the meridian, in Spitsbergen. 
To Professors Nordenskjéld and Dunér and Herr Malmgren our best 
thanks are due for their kindness in furnishing us with much valu- 
able information, the results of their former arduous explorations in 
this distant country. 
On leaving England there had been two points in the ornithology 
of Spitsbergen to which I had especially meant to apply myself. The 
first was the obtaining of a good series of specimens of the Spits- 
bergen Lagopus, a single example of which, brought from that 
country in 1855 by my friends Mr. W. Sturge and the late Mr. E. 
Evans, had been described by Mr. Gould in our ‘ Proceedings ’ for 
1858 (p. 354) as a distinct species under the name of L. hemileucu- 
rus ; the second was the determination of the large species of Wild 
Goose, which the same gentlemen found breeding on the shores of Ice 
Fjord (Ibis, 1859, pp. 171, 172). Of the latter, as I have already 
mentioned, we saw a considerable number ; and though we failed in 
our efforts to obtain a specimen, yet, through Mr. Malmgren’s kind- 
ness, I am able to declare that the species is Anser brachyrhynchus, 
since I saw and examined two examples in his possession. Of the 
first, though, I regret to say, unsuccessful in finding out its haunts, 
I likewise bad the pleasure of being shown by Mr. Malmgren an 
adult male, killed but a few days previously, and still unskinned. 
Its plumage, however, presented scarcely any trace of the great vernal 
change which takes place in this group of birds ; and, except that I 
am confident that the Ptarmigan of Spitsbergen is distinct from that 
of continental Europe and Britain, I hardly like to form an opinion 
respecting its specific distinctness from the Ptarmigan of Iceland, 
Greenland, and Labrador, which I am inclined to consider as forming 
but one species, to which the name L. rupestris, being the oldest, 
should probably be applied. 
After passing an agreeable week in Ice Fjord, and being joined 
by our Norwegian consort, we returned southwards, and proceeded 
towards the most western of the Thousand Islands. Here some of 
our party were transhipped to go to the eastward in the jeg¢ in 
search of Walruses, while the ‘Sultana’ made another attempt to 
ascend the Stor Fjord ; but, finding the ice at a distance of about 
twenty miles above the bight still unmoved, she was compelled to 
retrace her course, and await the return of the jegt party off the 
Thousand Islands. In Stor Fjord we made the acquaintance of the 
third species of Seal known in Spitsbergen, the very widely distri- 
buted Pagophilus grenlandicus of Dr. Gray’s Catalogue. This animal 
is known to the frequenters of the coast as the “‘ Jan-Mayen Kobbe”’ 
and “Svart-side ;”” but most generally as the ‘ Springer,” from its 
lively actions in the water. It is of a social disposition, and we saw 
it in herds not less than fifty in number. These were very fond of 
swimming in line, their heads alone above water, engaged in a game 
of “ follow-my-leader ;” for on the first Seal making a roll over, or 
a spring into the air, each Seal of the whole procession, on arriving 
