328 
A VOYAGE TO SPITZBERGEN. 
present itself, and in collecting fresh stores of facts, 
such as we might find worthy of record, or to turn 
towards the south, and run for Norway, to visit the 
numerous ports of call along her coast, as we made for 
home. One weighty influence was ever present with 
us—the state of the weather, which, for some days, had 
been undergoing a frequent and steady change. The 
cold was setting in with unusual severity; the 
southerly wind was driving the ice nearer and nearer 
into the shallow bays, where the blocks were rapidly 
being cemented together by the formation of bay ice 
at their base; corners where, in ordinary years, the 
water would have remained open and free from drift 
ice, were now choked altogether. To such a cause 
may be attributed the general condition of the season 
in these remote regions in certain years; and, as an 
instance of its effects, the greater degree of warmth in 
some summers in Iceland, when contrasted with others, 
may fairly be traced to the influence of a strong and 
prevailing southerly wind; naturally the correspond¬ 
ing increase of cold on the west coast of Spitzbergen 
would follow, and the interior would equally suffer 
from the cold blasts of air carried over the land from 
the frozen fiords. Subsequent events have proved that 
our opinion was well founded. This -year the winter 
in northern Europe has been unusually mild, while the 
