825 



writes: »but the ice was so thick that it filled up all the fjords 

 and sounds between the various islands of the archipelago, thus 

 forming one compact mer de glace which flowed outwards in all 

 directions from the dominant points, and discharged its icebergs 

 into the surrounding ocean «. But as the Faeroes lie so far out in 

 the Atlantic Ocean, they cannot have been far from the open sea, 

 and possibly there may then as nowadays have been strong cur- 

 rents at the coasts, and for this reason the ice may not have reached 

 everywhere to the bottom of the sea in the sublittoral region, some 

 of the sublittoral algae thus being spared. 



In accordance with what I have previously said about the 

 possibilities of immigration of the fresh-water algae (7), it seems to 

 me that there cannot be any doubt, that the marine algae -flora 

 has likewise been able to immigrate to the islands across the sea 

 from the coasts of North Europe, and by the agency of factors 

 which are at work to this day. Thus, the possibility of immigration 

 always exists, and a postglacial land-bridge is not at all necessary 

 to explain the occurrence of the algae-flora. 



In perfect agreement with Warming's view^ regarding the land- 

 flora, I may therefore conclude by saying that the marine algae 

 of the islands have also been able to immigrate after the 

 glacial period across the sea from the nearest countries, 

 especially from the British Islands, but also from Norway 

 and from Iceland. 



V. 



SOME BIOLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 



It is a w^ell- known fact, that at different seasons of the year, 

 no small difference is discernible in the appearance and luxuriance 

 of the algal vegetation in the northern seas. This has been men- 

 tioned by Kjellman (49) with reference to Bohuslan, and other au- 

 thors e. g. Gran (37, p. 15) and Rosenvinge (71) have expressed 

 the same view for other regions of the sea. On the Faeroese 

 coasts the development and luxuriance of the algal vegetation like- 

 wise vary according to the seasons. Unfortunately, I myself have 

 only spent some months of the spring and summer on the Faeroes 

 and have therefore only been able to make an incomplete study 

 of the development of the vegetation throughout the year; but this 

 want has been greatly helped out by the collection of algae from 



