July 7, 1911] 



SCIENCE 



societies will now have greater facilities 

 than ever before. 



Those of us who were associated with 

 the club in its infancy are watching with 

 most intense interest its evolution into ma- 

 turity. We are expecting great things of 

 the Chemists' Club and I am sure we shall 

 not be disappointed. With its past as a 

 background, with its organization and 

 equipment as a foundation, and with the 

 opportunities before it as inspiration, the 

 auguries for the future are bright indeed. 

 Wm. McMuetrie 



THE WORK OF THE "MICHAEL SABS" IN 

 THE NORTH ATLANTIC IN 1910 '^ 



Dr. Hjort's preliminary account of the 

 Michael Sars expedition is so important, both 

 to the oceanographer and to the marine biol- 

 ogist, that a resume is justified, although the 

 final report is yet to come. 



The expedition, under the direction of Sir 

 John Murray and Dr. Hjort, left Plymouth 

 in April, ran thence to the west of Ireland, 

 across the Bay of Biscay to Gibraltar, and so 

 to the Canaries. From here the course was 

 a " large section of the Atlantic," visiting the 

 Azores, the Sargasso Sea and eventually New- 

 foundland, whence a section was undertaken 

 to Ireland. Finally work was carried on 

 south and north of the Wyville Thompson 

 ridge. 



Especially instructive are the hydrographic 

 sections of the northwestern Atlantic, the ob- 

 servations on currents in the Straits of 

 Gibraltar and off the Azores, the notes on the 

 smaller plankton, and the data acquired on 

 the bathymetric distribution of the fishes and 

 crustaceans of the intermediate waters. 



The sections from the Sargasso Sea to 

 Newfoundland and from Newfoundland to 

 Ireland show that the surface layer of warm 

 water with high salinity (over 35 per m.) is 

 very much thicker on the eastern than on the 

 western side of the Atlantic. Off the New- 



' Johan Hjort, ' ' The ' Michael Sars ' North At- 

 lantic Deep-sea Expedition, 1910," Geographical 

 Journal, Vol. 37, 1911, pp. 349-377, 500-523. 



foundland bank the uniform " bottom water " 

 with a temperature of about 2.5° C, and 

 salinity of about 34.9 per m., rises close to the 

 surface. 



If we compare these observations with data 

 obtained by the Challenger and by the Blake, 

 with the scattered records made by the Alba- 

 tross, and with the few temperatures I have 

 myseK taken in the intermediate waters of 

 the Gulf Stream, we find that they are all in 

 accord on this main point. In the northern 

 portion of the Gulf Straam its warm waters 

 are extremely shallow along its inner edge. 



The two sections in question illustrate 

 what to the oceanographer is a most impor- 

 tant discovery; viz., an upwelling of the cold 

 bottom water partially dividing the warm 

 surface layer into two bands. Thus on the 

 line Newfoundland-Ireland, the temperature 

 at station 83 at about 275 fathoms is the same 

 as it is at 350 fathoms at stations 81 and 85, 

 east and west of it; i. e., 8° C. (46.4° F.). And 

 the salinity curve shows a similar rise. On 

 the line Sargasso Sea-Newfoundland, the 

 " sunderance " of the warm surface water is 

 much more extreme. Thus at station 66 water 

 of 8° C. (46.4° F.) was found at only about 150 

 fathoms, and of only 14° C. (5Y.2° F.) and 

 salinity of 35 per m. within less than 50 

 fathoms of the surface. 



On looking over the Challenger tempera- 

 tures on the line Halifax-Bermuda, taking 

 the actual observations, and not those com- 

 puted from the " average curve " I was struck 

 by the fact that at station 53, at roughly the 

 same relative position, the temperature at 

 100 and at 300 fathoms was about the same 

 as it was about 50 fathoms deeper at stations 

 52 and 54, on either side of it. The variation 

 of only about 1° F. is a very slight one, but 

 taken in conjunction with the observations of 

 the Michael Sars, and with the fact that the 

 upward swing of the isotherms lies in the 

 direct continuation of the cold ridge shown 

 by Dr. Hjort in his chart of the conditions at 

 200 fathoms, it certainly suggests the possibil- 

 ity that it was an actual phenomenon in 18Y3 

 as it was in 1910, not a faulty observation. 



Dr. Hjort suggests that if this remarkable 



