1880. } Geography and Travels. 545 
islands, and one of the group south of the Auckland islands. 
These observatories would endeavor to ascertain the answers 
to the following questions: 1. Are the differences in the daily 
periods of magnetic disturbances known to us special in the 
localities, or are they annual phenomena? 2. How are the 
disturbance-intensities in different places related to each other? 
3. Does the disturbance-intensity stand in a determinate rela- 
tion to one of the fundamental magnetic elements ? I 
what relation do the disturbances on one side stand to those of 
the other in the different parts of the Polar region? 5. How 
does the total intensity in the disturbances behave? 6. How far 
do the disturbances extend? 7. Are there fixed centers of dis- 
turbance, or do they form themselves, and shift positions like 
barometric depressions? 8. In what connection do the disturb- 
ances stand with regard to the zone of greatest intensity and fre- 
quency of the aurora borealis? 9g. In what connection do the 
stand with regard to the single aurora? and 10, with the different 
forms of the aurora? 11. What connection is there between the 
magnetic phenomena of the Arctic and Antarctic regions? and 
12, between them and electric earth currents. 
Dr. W. H. Dall, in charge of a corps of the U. S. Coast Sur- 
vey, expects to visit Behrings strait this summer, and if the sea- 
son permits will go as far as Point Barrow, to enable him to report 
on the feasibility of establishing a station there. 
A correspondent states in the Proceedings of the Royal Geo- 
graphical Society, as the result of observations taken for many 
yeats in Norway, of the aurora borealis, that “the aurora is 
neither seen during extreme cold or northerly winds, but appears 
when an ordinary Arctic temperature is raised by southerly and 
westerly winds, and is generally followed by snow. In the south- 
eastern part of Norway it seems to be especially caused by south- 
easterly winds, which are there very moist, and rather warm. Its 
appearance is always accompanied by a falling barometer. In my 
Opinion the phenomenon is due to the following causes. When 
a wind laden with warmth, moisture and electricity comes in con- 
tact with a body of cold air, the moisture is converted into snow, 
the warmth and electricity are thereby released, and the aurora is 
the result of the disturbance. The northern lights cannot occur 
in very high latitudes, because the warm moist air is cooled long 
efore it reaches them.” * a y etermination of 
the chemical elements involved, by means of spectrum analysis, 
is by no means the least of the numerous scientific results to be 
derived from Arctic exploration.” 
nother recent writer thus defines the principal zone of the 
Coast of North America, passes over Great Bear lake towards 
Hudson's bay, which it crosses in 60° N. lat., sweeps near Nain 
on the coast of Labrador, turns to the south of Cape Farewell, 
