NO. 4.] THE LAST TWO SUMMERS IN THE ICE. 51 



This specimen is thus spoken of in Sverdrup's journal: 



"14th September, 1895 Bentsen saa iaftes en Havhest, som hred- 



sede om Skihet en liden Stund, og trak derpaa vestover, effer Eaakene"} 

 Fulmars appeared in far greater numbers in the summer ol 1896, in 

 the ice north of Spitsbergen. The first was seen there on May 22nd (83° 45' 

 N. Lat.). They were afterwards seen all through the summer, singly or in 

 small flocks, circhng above the channels, and occasionally picking up little 

 animals or refuse from the surface of the water. From the middle of June 

 until the beginning of August, when the ship forced her way out of the ice, 

 about seventy specimens were shot by the crew, fifteen of them in one day 

 (July 16th; 83° 14' N. Lat.). They were principally utihsed as food for 

 the dogs. 



CepphMS mandti, (Licht.) 1822. 



The Spitsbergen guillemot was one of the birds that was observed com- 

 paratively often during the summer of 1895, north-east of Franz Josef Land. 

 They were generally seen, however, only singly or a few together ; on the 29th 

 May, four were observed at one time, and two of them were shot (84° 32' 

 N. Lat.). Altogether a dozen of this species were shot that summer, all in 

 a latitude higher than 84° N. The ship was then at least 380 kilometres 

 north-east of Franz Josef Land. 



This guillemot, which (like the continental form, Cepphus grylleYJinds 

 its food principally among the httoral fish-species, thus leads here also, 

 in these high northern latitudes, and at a distance of several hundred kilo- 

 metres from the nearest mainland or island, a kind of littoral life m the 

 channels, or among the floating pieces of ice; and it is probably Gadus saida 

 that constitutes its principal food, 



North of Spitsbergen, in the summer of 1896, the Spitsbergen guillemot 

 was unusually numerous by the open channels, from latitude 84° N., south- 

 wards as far as the northern shores of Spitsbergen, this, and Alle alle, being 

 the most numerous of all the species of birds that appeared in these latitudes. 

 Sometimes as many as twenty of these guillemots might be brought down 

 on one day, and almost one hundred and fifty were shot for the table. Dr. 



1 "Bentsen saw a fulmar this evening, which circled about the ship for a whUe, and 

 then flew away towards the west, following the channels". 



