42 THREE CRUISES OF THE ' BLAKE.” 
Torell at depths of over 1,000 fathoms, during his first expe- 
dition to Spitzbergen, were only noticed by Keferstein ' in 1846. 
Similar observations by Sir James Clark Ross (1841) in the 
Antarctic Ocean, at a depth of 400 fathoms, passed equally 
without notice. 
Yet as early as 1863 Professor Lovén? at the Meeting of 
Scandinavian Naturalists held in Stockholm, gave a Report on 
the expeditions of Torell to Greenland and Spitzbergen, in 1859 
and 1861. These had demonstrated beyond doubt (with the 
dredge) the existence at the deepest point reached (250 to 300 
fathoms) of a fauna belonging to all the classes of marine in- 
vertebrates. With the “ Bulldog” machine Torell brought up 
from the great depth of 1,000 and 1,400 fathoms foraminifera, 
mollusca, annelids, crustacea, echinoderms, and sponges. In 
1868 Sars” published a long list of animals dredged to a depth 
of 450 fathoms by his son G. O. Sars, off the coast of Norway, 
since 1862. These belonged to all groups of marme inverte- 
brates and seemed to show without doubt, as was well put by 
Lovén, that off the Norwegian coast, at least, the zero point of 
animal life had not yet been discovered; he further threw out 
hints in regard to the existence of a uniform abyssal fauna over 
the bottom of the Oceans which have formed the basis of all 
subsequent speculations on this subject. From that time the 
Swedes and Norwegians have been most zealous in their explora- 
tions of the physics and natural history of the Arctic regions. 
They have sent expeditions to Iceland, to Spitzbergen, and 
Greenland, with Smitt, Goés, Ljungman, and Malmgren as 
zoülogists, and although dredging had not then been developed 
to its full extent, a few hauls were made by the “ Bulldog” ma- 
chine to a depth of 2,600 fathoms, which showed the existence 
at those depths of a large number of invertebrates. Their last 
expeditions were those of Nordenskiöld and of the “ Josephine” 
(which ran a section across the Atlantic) with Captain Von Otter 
as Commander. He had been the successful chief of the earlier 
expedition of the “Sofia” to the Arctic region. 
1 Nachricht. d. K. Gesell. d. Wiss. z. ? In 1850 Sars gave a preliminary ac- 
Gottingen, 1846. count of a dredging trip to the Lofoten 
? See also Rept. Brit. Ass. Adv. Se. Islands in 1849. 
York Meeting, 1844. 
