and then ice, even toward the south. Such drift ice is better to come down on than open water. We changed out course accordingly by turning northward where the ice was better. We made slow progress with 40° of drift, at times more than we had all last night. We called wireless stations in an effort to get our bearings, but in vain. At last we crossed land and saw an Eskimo hut. We tried to go down to ask our position, but heavy squalls and bumps in the air prevented this. Then we went up through the fog to reach the sun and thus got our latitude observations. During this time we had drifted a good distance inland into Alaska. It took us one hour to reach the coast again after we had dropped to a lower altitude, as we had lost our exact position. The fog was very thick now. We could hear the Nome wireless calling another station, and had just time to pick up his bearings. Then our position was soon found. We were making for Cape Prince of Wales. We travelled always in a north-westerly direction, with 80° drift. Often we started only to stall. From Cape Prince of Wales we followed the coast, but the wind now was down the mountains and very bumpy, throwing the ship about. A barograph curve looked like a seismograph curve. We again lost our position. The ship was so bumpy it prevented us from going lower for visibility. As the wind was always increasing, we gave up looking for Nome and decided to land at Teller, where the ground conditions seemed favourable. It appears that the figures for position reported during the flight by Mr. Ramm are rounded off to the nearest degree or half-degree, and in themselves provide little material for judging the accuracy of navigation. The radio direction-compass working on the station at King's Bay must have been a useful check on longitude not available to Commander Byrd. The sun compass, on the other hand, seems to have been mounted outside the gondola and stopped by accumulation of ice. They had fine weather to the Pole and then much fog and cloud, but fortunately obtained a position line directed to Point Barrow, which gave them a good landfall. The story afterwards is a little obscure. The last twenty-four hours after sighting Point Barrow provided a searching test of the endurance and skill of pilot, navigator, and engineers, from which they emerged with success, and are to be congratulated. We may well believe that the enterprise has given useful data for airship engineers, and that the builders of the Norge are deservedly satisfied with her performance. The conditions in which they crossed the Beaufort Sea may leave it doubtful whether low islands would have been seen; but the negative geographical result is important, if not sensational. As an exploit the voyage will rank high, and detailed study of the observations will doubtless furnish material of importance. The voyage has, however, been hailed as the pioneer journey on the route of the future from Europe to the Far East. One has only to look at a map on any zenithal projection for the horizon of London or Paris to see that this is nonsense. The great circle course from London to Tokyo, for example, runs along the northern coasts of Siberia, but never out across the Polar Ocean. The traveller of the future will not insist on going to Spitsbergen first; and airship routes will be laid out with some regard to facilities and traffic at intermediate points: with a certain consideration for the comfort of the service, and a very strict avoidance of the places where weather is likely to be as bad as the Norge found it about Bering Strait. FROM BURMA TO ASSAM BY THE KRONJONG ΟΝ PASS N May 5 Mr. Archibald Rose received a cablegram from Mr. D'Arcy Weatherbe, dated Sadiya, May 5, 2.50 p.m. : “Reached Ghalum River April 20, Sadiya May 5, from Hkamtilong across Kronjong Pass, completing my traverse Yangtse to Bramapatra," with the request that it should be communicated to the Secretary. Without previous. news of Mr. Weatherbe's movements the message was a little mysterious, and the reference to the Yangtse is still obscure but the details of a very interesting journey covering new ground are now available in a letter to Mr. Rose, dated "On train from Sadiya to Calcutta, March [evidently May] 8, 1926," from which the following passages are extracted: After spending a fortnight in Ceylon I went up to Madras and then to Rangoon and on to Myitkyina. I left there on March 2 and walked up the road to Putao-twenty marches-but arrived there on March 17. I fished about Namghkai for a fortnight, and after a good deal of trouble in trying to get coolies, I left Fort Hertz (Putao) on April 8 with a Ghurka servant, a Shan Mishmi interpreter, and eighteen coolies-Hkunungs, Kachins, and Lisu. A Mr. Stevenson, who had come up the Myitkyina road with me, was so very keen on coming across to Assam that I took him with me; he proved a pleasant and useful companion, as he spoke a little Kachin, and Hindustani well. We had an extremely hard journey up the Nam Yin and the Nam Kam-pi to the Krongjong Pass [spelled also Kronjawng and Kumjawng on Survey of India maps], which we reached only on April 20. On the third day seven of our Lisu coolies ran away, and we had to lie in camp for three days while we sent back to Hkamti and secured more coolies through Fisher, the D.S.O. there. After this we took their dahs and cross bows and arrows away from them every night, and thus effectively prevented them running away again, as they would not dare to move in the jungle without these weapons and implements. It turned out that the old Mishmi path which was supposed to exist up this river had become entirely obliterated, and it was necessary to cut our way through thick jungle a large part of the way, and for the last five days we had to cross and recross the river waist-deep and icy cold from ten to twelve times daily. This proved very trying, and when we found 2 feet of snow on the Assam side, the coolies almost gave in. As a matter of fact, we were all in bad condition with colds and fever, and I had to lie one day in camp on the other side, and for the next five days had to wade eight to nine hours a day with a temperature of from 100° to 103°. This moving on was absolutely necessary as the rice was getting low, and we had had to put the coolies on two-thirds to half rations for some days before. We reached the sources of the Ghalum [or, if the S. of I. 1/M map is at all correct, of one of its tributaries] in the snow, just over the pass, on April 20, and the first Mishmi villages on April 25, where we were able to get a little rice and maize. We followed the Ghalum down to its junction with the Zayul Chu, which, though a much longer river, has not so very much more water in it than the Ghalum. The Zayul comes in at right angles from the north-west [? S. of I. Krawnaon, and read north-east for north-west]. These two rivers form the Tellu, which is the Lohit Bramaputra, changing its name only at the junction of the Tiding, 100 miles [difficult to reconcile with map] from Sadiya; and although we did not know it when we left Putao, it is a fact that the whole of the country from the pass to beyond the Tiding is “unadministered"; but we had no trouble whatever with the Mishmis, and found them quite a manly and certainly a reasonably friendly and hospitable people, previous and contrary reports notwithstanding. Though we did not get any great quantities of rice and maize, etc., at any one village they generally, on our request to the headman, gave what they could afford, for which of course we paid liberally, though they left the amount entirely to us. It would have been indeed a grave matter had we been without their assistance, as at one time we had about ten days to go and only three days' rice! It is quite possible that they may have saved the lives even of some of our coolies, who, as you may imagine, were (as we also) overjoyed to again reach the region of Dak bungalows. On reaching Sadiya on May 5 I had entirely recovered from cold and fever, though Stevenson was rather miserable with fever, and we both are suffering rather badly with many septic jungle sores on the legs. I had about 1 stone to make up, but already have put on the half, thanks to the very kind hospitality of O'Callaghan, the Political Officer at Sadiya, with whom we stayed for several days. The Krongjong Pass from Burma to Assam is in the extreme north of Burma, close to the Tibetan border, and some way north of the region. recently described to the Society by Mr. Mills (Geogr. Fourn., April 1926). Its height is given as 10,000 feet on 1/250,000 92 E, and 9682 on 92 E/N.W. We believe that Mr. Weatherbe is right in thinking that he is the first European to cross the pass. In saying that he thus completes his traverse from the Yangtse to the Brahmaputra he is evidently referring to a traverse begun and carried to the Irrawaddy on a former journey. MERZ AND THE "METEOR" EXPEDITION THE Hugh Robert Mill, D.Sc., LL.D. HE death of Prof. Alfred Merz at the outset of his great oceanographical expedition on the Meteor, which was referred to in the March number of the Geographical Fournal, is from the point of view of the physical geographer a tragedy relieved only by the prospect of the ultimate success of a plan which provided against all contingencies. Prof. Merz, who died in his forty-sixth year, was a physical oceanographer pure and simple. He was a student and later a professor in the Oceanographical Institute of the University of Berlin presided over by Prof. Penck, and his outlook was untrammelled by the claims of official or industrial considerations, such as have hampered most of the leaders of the oceanographical expeditions from which our knowledge of the oceans has been slowly pieced together. Merz mastered the details of oceanography as far as they had been ascertained by his predecessors, and set himself to plan a system of research which should apply the most exact methods of modern physics to the direct study of the ocean basins and the conditions and movements of the water they contain. Speaking generally, physical oceanography was based on the pioneer observations of the Challenger, made at a time when our ignorance of oceanic conditions was profound and modern methods of precision had scarcely even reached the experimental stage. The revelations of the Challenger were supplemented by the detailed study of small areas with instruments and methods gradually increasing in precision and by a few lines of observations here and there in widely different parts of the ocean. These advances were carried out chiefly by the international researches of the Council for the Investigation of the Sea, led by the Scandinavian oceanographers, and by brief voyages of investigation mainly from the biological or fishery standpoint carried out by national institutions and private investigators. The Telegraph Companies, working from a utilitarian standpoint, took the lead in developing methods of sounding by wire. Merz was the first to approach the problem from the academic side. He taught his Berlin students the somewhat difficult technique of handling reversing thermometers capable of recording temperature at any depth to one-hundredth of a degree Centigrade, and to use the most delicate and efficient current meters both in the laboratory and in certain Prussian lakes, the temperatures and currents of which were studied in minute detail, a sort of oceanography in miniature. He himself had taken part in several deep-sea expeditions and acquired familiarity with work in deep water, while during the War he had made laborious studies of tidal currents at all depths in the North Sea and of the undercurrents which flow into the Black Sea through the Dardanelles and the Bosphorus. With mature experience and unabated enthusiasm Merz planned a great oceanographical expedition. The University of Berlin promoted the scheme, and funds were secured from public and private sources. The Meteor, a former naval surveying ship of 1300 tons displacement and 216 feet long, was secured with a nautical personnel of ex-naval officers and men. She was equipped with the sole aim of fitting her for oceanographical research of the highest precision. The navigating officers were provided with the most modern appliances for fixing the position at sea both astronomically and by bearings of the land, including the use of wireless time-signals and delicate range-finders. They had four different types of acoustic sounding-gear adapted for all depths, as well as the best mechanism for sounding by wire and obtaining samples of the deposits. On the framework of exact position and depth the oceanographical staff was charged with filling in details of the physical, chemical and tidal conditions of the whole depth of the ocean, the fundamental idea in the mind of Merz being to determine the circulation, both horizontal and vertical, of the water in the South Atlantic from 20° N. to the Antarctic ice. With this object he planned a series of fourteen cross-sections of the ocean involving a cruise of 64,000 sea miles, with about 360 stations for complete temperature soundings involving some 7000 separate temperature readings and salinity titrations. The results were to be worked up in a preliminary way as the voyage proceeded, so that the number, spacing and detail of the observing stations on each cross-section could be increased or varied in order to follow out the changes which were being observed. The ideal conditions for research were to be secured by the planner of the expedition himself directing the work and discussing the results as it progressed. When the Meteor, after a preliminary cruise to the Canaries, which led to a good deal of modification of instruments and methods, left Wilhelmshaven on 16 April 1925, her personnel consisted of Prof. Merz, the leader, four other physical oceanographers of proved experience, a biologist, a geologist, a chemist, two meteorologists, all of these being University men of standing and experienced in research work. The naval staff consisted of Captain Spiess of the German Navy, in command of the ship, a first officer, a navigator and three watch-keeping officers, an engineer, a surgeon, a paymaster, three assistant engineers, and seven signalmen and other ratings acting as laboratory assistants. The crew consisted of 104 warrant officers and men, the total number on board being 133. The outward voyage by the Cape Verdes and St. Paul's Rocks to Buenos Aires was interrupted only for one or two oceanographical soundings; but acoustic soundings, chiefly with the echo-sounding gear, were made at intervals of 2 or 3 sea-miles all the way, and a complete meteorological section of the atmosphere was made from north to south. Kiteobservations of all the elements were made up to 3000 metres at frequent intervals, and 50 ascents of pilot balloons were watched, those being sometimes followed to a height of 25,000 metres by angular measurement and the wind direction determined at all heights. Smoke bombs fired to a height of 7000 metres were used when only small patches of clear sky were available and the comparatively slow ascent of pilot balloons could not reach the necessary height before clouds drifted over. Electrical recording thermometers at the mast-head, bowsprit, and flag-staff gave continuous traces of air-temperature. The Meteor left Buenos Aires on 4 June 1925, to carry out work on the first cross-section eastwards along the parallel of 40° S. Five stations |