Chap. I. INTRODUCTION. 3 



was eleven days beset on the coast of Labrador in 

 floes of ice mixed with icebergs, many of which had 

 huge rocks upon them, gravel, soil, and pieces of 

 wood : in short, every account from various parts 

 of North America agreed in stating, that larger and 

 more numerous fields and bergs of ice had been 

 seen, at greater distances from their usual places, 

 in the years above mentioned, than had at any time 

 before been witnessed by the oldest navigators. The 

 fact, therefore, might be considered as too well au- 

 thenticated to admit of a doubt. 



It was at once concluded from whence the greater 

 part of these immense quantities of ice were de- 

 rived. In a letter from Mr. Scoresby the younger, 

 an intelligent navigator of the Greenland seas, to 

 Sir Joseph Banks, he says, " I observed on my 

 last voyage (1817) about two thousand square 

 leagues (eighteen thousand square miles) of the 

 surface of the Greenland seas, included between 

 the parallels 74° and 80°, perfectly void of ice, all 

 of which had disappeared within the last two years." 

 And he further states that although, on former 

 voyages, he had very rarely been able to penetrate 

 the ice, between the latitudes of 76° and 80°, so far to 

 the west as the meridian of Greenwich, on his last 

 voyage he twice reached the longitude of 10° west; 

 that in the parallel of 74° he approached the coast 

 of Old Greenland ; that there was little ice near the 

 land ; and he added, " that there could be no 



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