Prof. Norclenskiolcl — Expedition to Greenland. 357 



which had been carried away to a distant part of the ice by sundry 

 now dried tip g^lacier- streams, into so strong a process of fermenta- 

 tion or putrefaction, that the mass, even at a great distance, emitted 

 a most disagreeable smell, like that of butyric acid. 



Dr. Berggren has communicated the following notice^ of the 

 microscopic organisms met with on the inland ice. 



" One of the species of algee met with on the inland ice occurred in 

 such vast quantities, that the surface of the ice throughout larger or 

 smaller tracts was tinted with a peculiar colour. Two others seemed 

 exclusively to belong to the fine sand, which is found either in the 

 form of a thin covering on the surface of the ice, or as a more or 

 less thick layer at the bottom of the pipe-like holes that appear in 

 the surface. The first-mentioned species, occurring copiously, does 

 not require any such substratum, but is found principally on the 

 sides of ice-hills, where the water from the melting ice filtered itself 

 out between the little inequalities of the surface. 



" The most copiously represented species has the form of a short 

 thread, not spreading out in branches, but consisting of a single 

 row of cells ; the number of cells in each thread is 2, 4, 8, or at 

 most 16. Threads of 4 and 8 cells are most common. The species 

 very frequently appears only as a single cell. The threads are usually 

 a little bent, sometimes, when the number of cells is 16, forming ^ 

 complete semicircle. The number two or its multiples taken as the 

 standard for the number of cells in the separate threads is accounted 

 for by the regular continuous bisection of the cells, whereby their pro- 

 pagation proceeds. The connexion between the cells is the looser the 

 older the partitions become, as the older membranes assume a looser 

 consistence. In a thread of 16 cells, the connexion between the eighth 

 and ninth cells is soon broken, and in the two threads thus resulting 

 the connexion between the fourth and fifth cells is weaker than that 

 between the second and third or the sixth and seventh. The threads 

 therefore often lie bent at an angle. The diameter of the cells is 

 0-008 — 0-012 mm., and their length 0-016 — 0-040 mm. Individual 

 cells may sometimes attain a length 0-065 mm. and a breadth of 

 0-015 mm., whereas a great number of other single cells are met with 

 of very small dimensions, from spherical forms of only 0-006 mm. 

 diameter to those of ordinary form and size. As the ends of the 

 cells, where they are joined together, are rounded, there is, of course, 

 a contraction between them, which becomes more and more con- 

 spicuous as the connexion between them is loosened by time. The 

 membrane is thin and hyaline, and its outermost layer (the remnants 

 of the membranes of the mother-cells altered after division) is of an 

 almost slimy consistence, whereby the cells are for some time kept 

 together. The contents of the cells are in part concealed by a dark 

 purple-brown colouring-matter, which in dried cells is immediately 

 drawn out on wetting them. The centre of the cells is occupied by 

 an oblong or cylindrical mass of chlorophyll, of somewhat irregular 



1 A more detailed account, accompanied by drawings, of these remarkable Algic 

 will hereafter be published in the " K. Vet. Akademiens Ofversigt." 



