524. ON CHANGES OF TEMPERATURE IN THE ARCTIC WINTER. 
also harmonizes with the fact that the warm winds, as mentioned by 
the officer of the Foz, in different parts of Baffin’s Bay come from 
different points of the compass; while on the same coast they come 
from the same point. Thus Wrangell, as quoted above, mentions that 
in the part of the Siberian coast which he explored, a S.E. by E. 
wind sometimes raises the thermometer upwards of fifty degrees, while 
a S.S.E. wind has no effect on the temperature at all. This proves 
that the rise of, temperature cannot be due to the transport of a mass 
of warm air; but it may be easily accounted for by supposing that 
the form of the coast enables the warmth-producing wind to act at 
a special advantage in breaking up or driving away the ice, and 
liberating the heat of the waters. 
These extraordinary fluctuations of temperature appear to be:com- 
mon to the whole of the Arctic regions. Sir John Richardson, in 
his recent work on the Polar regions, states that ‘in Arctic America 
the phenomenon of warm winds (teplot weter of Wrangell) also 
occurs, and makes the month in which they happen, whether Decem- 
ber, January, or February, warmer than the other two. The same 
warm wind was probably the cause of the rain which the Russian 
sailors observed in Spitzbergen in the month of January.” 
Rain implies a temperature several degrees above +289, which is 
the temperature of the stratum of sea-water immediately below the 
ice. But we know that in the Polar regions the temperature of the 
sea increases in descending, until a stratum is reached of the invariable 
temperature of +39°; and we may suppose that in these storms the 
warmer water of the deeper strata is brought to the surface, and 
warms the air sufficiently to admit of rain. We know that powerful 
winds are able to produce temporary local currents, and it is easy to 
see that such a current when produced in a limited space free of ice, 
will give rise to this kind of vertical circulation, or interchange be- 
tween strata of different depths. 
Such storms as these must be eminently favourable to the produc- 
tion of ram; for the air that becomes warmed by contact with the 
comparatively warm water will, of course, take up watery vapour, 
and when it comes into contact with other masses of air that retain 
their usual intense cold, the vapour will be rapidly condensed; so 
that we cannot wonder at heavy rains being a general concomitant of 
these storms. 
Wrangell, in the passages I have quoted, says the warm wind in 
