49 



ice frani the tops of the floes. Soon pools of this water collect and 

 expand in all the depressions of the moutoneed cover, greatly accel- 

 erating the wastage. Looking down from the airship, one beheld the 

 ice below spread out to the horizon, a vast panoply of lace, the water 

 and the ice furnishing the design and pattern. In the case of fast 

 ice, i. e., sea ice which is held fast to the shore, the unifonn regularity 

 of the position of pools of water to mounds of ice, easily identified 

 such areas, even at long distances. The fields which had drifted 

 farthest toward the more open sea, were, naturally, loosest, with 

 innumerable cracks and separations spreading rapidly. Inundation 

 by sea water, in such areas, traveled apace with the spread of the 

 melted ice water. 



After rounding the northern end of Crown Prince Rudolf Island 

 the ship headed eastward 300 miles to Severnaya Zemlya (Northern 

 Land). With the exception of the drift of the Russian ship St. Anna 

 during the years 1912-1914, between longitudes 17 and 30 east, we 

 were now blazing a new trail in the Arctic. No new islands or other 

 land were sighted, however, and the principal object of visible interest 

 remained the pack ice. 



Flying over such a large icy area an observer is impressed much 

 more by the ever-changing colors and reflections, than he would be if 

 he journeyed on the surface of the ice itself. For example, in the small 

 open water areas which fringed the pack in Franz Josef Land, at 

 twilight July 27, the surface of the sea took on a strange and peculiar 

 appearance. The water was scummed with a film which looked like 

 cooling grease, the well-known signs of the initial stage of ice forma- 

 tion. The slight loss of heat during the brief Arctic twilight had been 

 sufficient to sway this critical temperature balance. Another in- 

 teresting observation was the varying color of the ice, where for miles 

 along our track, in the northern part of the Kara Sea, patches of ice, 

 from one to several feet in size, exhibited dark muddy browns, 

 greenish browns, ultramarine greens, and tawny yellows. The 

 predominance of such areas between Franz Josef Land and Severnaya 

 Zemlya, completely offset the flat, whiteness of the cover, so natural 

 to pack ice in polar seas. Undoubtedly this coloring was due to the 

 chlorphyll of algae and planktonic life that had blossomed and multi- 

 plied in the pools formed by the melting of the ice. They certainly 

 must attain a relatively high temperature during the warm, sunny 

 days of midsummer. 



With monotonous regularity of scenery we crossed the ice-covered 

 sea to Severnaya Zemlya, arriving there at OGOO on July 28. The 

 proportions of ice to water along this leg did not exceed at any time, 

 in a given area, 25 per cent. In a belt, midway of the run, however, 

 the ice appeared lighter in weight, and the polynyas seemed to be 

 more numerous than elsewhere. Could this condition of the pack be 



