Note 11 — Chapter VII · The Spring and Summer of 1894

This dust, which is to be seen in summer on the upper surface of almost all polar ice of any age, is no doubt, for the most part, dust that hovers in the earth’s atmosphere. It probably descends with the falling snow, and gradually accumulates into a surface layer as the snow melts during the summer. Larger quantities of mud, however, are also often to be found on the ice, which strongly resemble this dust in color, but are doubtless more directly connected with land, being formed on floes that have originally lain in close proximity to it. (Compare Wissensch. Ergebnisse von Dr. F. Nansens Durchquerung von Grönland. Ergänzungsheft No. 105 zu Petermanns Mittheilungen.)