1868.] Nordenskiold on the Swedish Arctic Explorations of 1868. ] 29 



I. " Account of Explorations by the Swedish Arctic Expedition at 

 the close of the Season 1868, in a Letter to the President." By- 

 Professor A. Nordenskiold. Communicated by the President. 

 Received November 20, 1868. 



Tromso, October 23, 18G8. 



Sir, — The second geographical part of our expedition anchored a few 

 days ago in the harbour of Tromso, after a difficult and adventurous 

 autumn cruise of a month in the polar basin north of 80° lat. ; and as 

 these regions were never before visited in such a late season, I hope that our 

 observations will be of interest for the arctic men of Great Britain, as contri- 

 buting to settle some points of the polar question recently much debated. 



According to the plan adopted for the Swedish Expedition, five of its 

 naturalists returned, in the middle of September, to Tromso with one of the 

 small ships that brought coal to our depot at Amsterdam Island, and the 

 same day the • Sofia,' with the remaining part of the expedition (consisting 

 of v. Otter, Berggren, Nystrom, Palander, Lemstrom, and myself), steamed 

 northward for Seven Islands, where it was our intention to wait for a fa- 

 vourable occasion to go further. But finding these islands so surrounded 

 by ice that no anchorage was accessible, we were compelled to abandon this 

 plan and go directly northward, following a tolerably large opening in the 

 pack. After a cruise of some days among the ice we, on the 19th of Sep- 

 tember, at long, east of Greenwich, reached 81° 42' N. Lat. ; but, as 

 may be seen by the adjoined photograph, the ice further northward was 

 so closed that it was impossible even for a boat to advance. We turned 

 westward, in vain looking for another practicable opening. Following the 

 border of the pack, we were, on the 24th September, at a longitude of 2° W. 

 already south of 79° lat., after often having passed fields of drift-ice covered 

 with particles of earth, which seems to indicate that laud is to be met with 

 further northward. Despairing of finding the ice westward more favourable, 

 and anxious to make a new survey later in the autumn of the position of 

 the ice-field between 0° and 20° long., we returned to our coal-depot. 



North of 80° 30' the season was already far more advanced than one 

 would presume from the observations at Spitzbergen during the first part 

 of September. The temperature of the air being —6° to —8° (Centigrade) 

 below zero, the surface of the sea was, when calm, covered by a layer of new 

 ice more than an inch thick ; and after sunset the obscurity, increased 

 by constant intense frost-rime, made the sailing or steaming among the ice 

 both uncertain and dangerous. As the salt water has no maximum of den- 

 sity, the freezing of the surface overadepth of 1000 to 2000 fathoms would be 

 difficult to explain, were it not that the sea- water in the polar regions is by the 

 melting of the ice and the heavy autumnal snowfalls less salt, and accordingly 

 lighter, even when at a temperature lower than that of the layers beneath. 



The last w r eek of September was employed in filling our coal-boxes and 

 refitting our steamer for a new struggle with the ice. During these days 

 a strong easterly snow-storm prevailed, which made us hope to find the 

 newly-formed ice broken and the pack more dispersed than before. Our 



