e wind, and thus principally
from N.W. to S.E. Even this shallow stream heaped snowdrifts
everywhere where there was any protection from the wind, and buried
more certainly, if less rapidly, than the drifting snow of the
storm, exposed objects and trampled footpaths. The quantity of
water, which in a frozen form is removed in this certainly not deep,
but uninterrupted and rapid current over the north coast of Siberia
to more southerly regions, must be equal to the mass of water in the
giant rivers of our globe, and play a sufficiently great _role_,
among others as a carrier of cold to the most northerly forest
regions, to receive the attention of meteorologists.

The humidity of the air was observed both by August's psychrometer
and Saussure's hygrometer. But I do not believe that these
instruments give trustworthy results at a temperature considerably
under the freezing-point. Moreover the degree of humidity at the
place where there can be a question of setting up a psychrometer and
hygrometer during a wintering in the high north, has not the
meteorological importance which has often been ascribed to it. For
the instruments are as a rule set up in an isolated louvre case,
standing at a height above the surface convenient for reading. While
the snow is drifting almost uninterruptedly it is impossible to keep
this case clear of snow. Even the air, which was originally quite
dry, must here be saturated with moisture through evaporation from
the surrounding layers of snow and from the snow dust which whirls
about next the surface of the earth. In order to determine the true
degree of humidity in the air, I would accordingly advise future
travellers to these regions to weigh directly the water which a
given measure of air contains by absorbing it in tubes with chloride
of calcium, calcined sulphate of copper, or sulphuric acid. It would
be easy to arrange an instrument for this purpose so that the whole
work could be done under deck, the air from any stratum under the
mast-top being examined at will. If I had had the means to make such
an examination at the _Vega's_ winter quarters, it would certainly
have appeared that the relative humidity of the air at a height of
some few metres above the surface of the earth was for the most part
exceedingly small.

The sandy neck of land which on the side next the vessel divided the
lagoons from the sea, was bestrewn with colossal bones of the whale,
and with the refuse of the Chuk