VII.] 
SELF-DEAD ANIMALS. 
323 
expeditions in the Arctic regions, where animal life during 
summer is so exceedingly abundant, the case just mentioned 
has been one of the few in which I have found remains of recent 
vertebrate animals which could he proved to have died a natural 
death. Near hunting-grounds there are to be seen often enough 
the remains of reindeer, seals, foxes, or birds that have died 
from gunshot wounds, but no self-dead Polar bear, seal, walrus, 
white whale, fox, goose, auk, lemming or other vertebrate. The 
Polar bear and the reindeer are found there in hundreds, the 
seal, walrus, and white whale in thousands, and birds in millions.^ 
These animals must die a “ natural ” death in untold numbers. 
What becomes of their bodies ? Of this we have for the 
present no idea, and yet we have here a problem of immense 
importance for the answering of a large number of questions 
concerning the formation of fossiliferous strata. It is strange 
in any case that on Spitzbergen it is easier to find vertebrae of 
a gigantic lizard of the Trias, than bones of a self-dead seal, 
walrus, or bird, and the same also holds good of more southerly 
inhabited lands. 
On the 13th August we again sailed past a large number of 
small rocks or islands. The sea was at first pretty free of ice, 
but was afterwards bestrewed with even, thin pieces of drift-ice, 
which were not forced up on each other, and thus had not been 
exposed in winter to any ice-pressure. This ice did not cause 
any inconvenience to the navigation, but at the same time all 
was wrapt in a very close mist, which soon compelled us to 
anchor near the shore in a little bay. I endeavoured without 
success to determine the position of the place by astronomical 
observations. Along the shore there still remained nearly 
everywhere a pretty high snow and ice-foot, which in the fog 
1 I can remember only one other instance of finding self-dead vertebrate 
animals, viz. when in 1873, as has already been stated (p.llO), I found 
a large number of dead rotges on the ice at the mouth of Hinloopen 
Strait., 
Y 2 
