Table of Temperatures
| Depths | Temperature | ||
| Degrees | |||
| Metres | Fathoms | Centigrade | Fahrenheit |
| Surface | ... | +1.02 | 33.83 |
| 2 | 1 | -1.32 | 29.62 |
| 20 | 10 | -1.33 | 29.61 |
| 40 | 21 | -1.50 | 29.3 |
| 60 | 32 | -1.50 | 29.3 |
| 80 | 43 | -1.50 | 29.3 |
| 100 | 54 | -1.40 | 29.48 |
| 120 | 65 | -1.24 | 29.77 |
| 140 | 76 | -0.97 | 30.254 |
| 160 | 87 | -0.58 | 30.96 |
| 180 | 98 | -0.31 | 31.44 |
| 200 | 109 | -0.03 | 31.95 |
| 220 | 120 | +0.19 | 32.34 |
| 240 | 131 | +0.20 | 32.36 |
| 260 | 142 | +0.34 | 32.61 |
| 280 | 153 | +0.42 | 32.76 |
| 300 | 164 | +0.34 | 32.61 |
| 350 | 191 | +0.44 | 32.79 |
| 400 | 218 | +0.35 | 32.63 |
| 450 | 273 | +0.34 | 32.61 |
| 600 | 328 | +0.26 | 32.47 |
| 700 | 382 | +0.14 | 32.25 |
| 800 | 437 | +0.07 | 32.126 |
| 900 | 492 | -0.04 | 31.928 |
| 1000 | 546 | -0.10 | 31.82 |
| 1200 | 656 | -0.28 | 31.496 |
| 1400 | 765 | -0.34 | 31.39 |
| 1600 | 874 | -0.46 | 31.17 |
| 1800 | 984 | -0.60 | 30.92 |
| 2000 | 1093 | -0.66 | 30.81 |
| 2600 | 1421 | -0.74 | 30.67 |
| 2900 | 1585 | -0.76 | 30.63 |
| 3000 | 1640 | -0.73 | 30.76 |
| 3700 | 2023 | -0.65 | 30.83 |
| 3800 | 2077 | -0.64 | 30.85 |
| 325 | 177 | +0.49 | 32.88 |
| +0.85 | 33.53 | ||
| +0.76 | 33.37 | ||
| +0.78 | 33.40 | ||
| +0.62 | 33.12 | ||
These temperatures of the water are in many respects remarkable. In the first place, the temperature falls, as will be seen, from the surface downward to a depth of 80 metres, after which it rises to 280 metres, falls again at 300 metres, then rises again at 326 metres, where it was +0.49°; then falls to rise again at 450 metres, then falls steadily down to 2000 metres, to rise once more slowly at the bottom. Similar risings and fallings were to be found in almost all the series of temperatures taken, and the variations from one month to another were so small that at the respective depths they often merely amounted to the two-hundredth part of a degree. Occasionally the temperature of the warm strata mounted even higher than mentioned here. Thus on October 17th at 300 metres it was +0.85°, at 350 metres +0.76°, at 400 metres +0.78°, and at 500 metres +0.62°, after which it sank evenly, until, towards the bottom, it again rose as before.
We had not expected to meet with much bird life in these desolate regions. Our surprise, therefore, was not small when on Whitsunday, May 13th, a gull paid us a visit. After that date we regularly saw birds of different kinds in our vicinity till at last it became a daily occurrence, to which we did not pay any particular attention. For the most part they were ice mews (Larus eburneus), kittiwakes (Rissa tridactyla), fulmars (Procellaria glacialis), and now and then a blue gull (L. glaucus), a herring gull (L. argentatus?), or a black guillemot (Uria grylle); once or twice we also saw a skua (probably Lestris parasitica)—for instance, on July 14th. On July 21st we had a visit from a snow-bunting.
Summer guests
Two Ivory Gulls (Larus eburneus) One Arctic Petrel (Procellaria glacialis) One Snow-bunting (Plectrophenax nivalis)
(From a photograph)
On August 3d a remarkable occurrence took place: we were visited by the Arctic rose gull (Rhodostethia rosea). I wrote as follows about it in my diary: “To-day my longing has at last been satisfied. I have shot Ross’s gull,”[1] three specimens in one day. This rare and mysterious inhabitant of the unknown north, which is only occasionally seen, and of which no one knows whence it cometh or whither it goeth, which belongs exclusively to the world to which the imagination aspires, is what, from the first moment I saw these tracts, I had always hoped to discover, as my eyes roamed over the lonely plains of ice. And now it came when I was least thinking of it. I was out for a little walk on the ice by the ship, and as I was sitting down by a hummock my eyes wandered northward and lit on a bird hovering over the great pressure-mound away to the northwest. At first I took it to be a kittiwake, but soon discovered it rather resembled the skua by its swift flight, sharp wings, and pointed tail. When I had got my gun, there were two of them together flying round and round the ship. I now got a closer view of them, and discovered that they were too light colored to be skuas. They were by no means shy, but continued flying about close to the ship. On going after them on the ice I soon shot one of them, and was not a little surprised, on picking it up, to find it was a little bird about the size of a snipe; the mottled back, too, reminded me also of that bird. Soon after this I shot the other. Later in the day there came another, which was also shot. On picking this one up I found it was not quite dead, and it vomited up a couple of large shrimps, which it must have caught in some channel or other. All three were young birds, about 12 inches in length, with dark mottled gray plumage on the back and wings; the breast and under side white, with a scarcely perceptible tinge of orange-red, and round the neck a dark ring sprinkled with gray.” At a somewhat later age this mottled plumage disappears; they then become blue on the back, with a black ring round the neck, while the breast assumes a delicate pink hue. Some few days afterwards (August 6th and 8th) some more of these birds were shot, making eight specimens in all.