MARTIN FROBISHER a.d. 



1577- 

 frosen within, that that water which should have recourse A probability 

 within the same to maintaine springs, hath not his thatthere 



, r i ^i_ • • *. ii i_ should be nei- 



motion, whereof great waters have their original!, as by thgj . > or 

 experience is seene otherwhere. Such valleis as are r i vers in the 

 capable to receive the water, that in the Summer time ground. 

 by the operation of the Sunne descendeth from great 

 abundance of snowe, which continually lyeth on the 

 mountaines and hath no passage, sinketh into the earth 

 and so vanisheth away, without any runnell above the 

 earth, by which occasion or continuall standing of the 

 said water, the earth is opened, and the great frost 

 yeeldeth to the force thereof, which in other places foure 

 or five fathoms within the ground for lacke of the said 

 moisture, the earth (even in the very Summer time) is 

 frosen, and so combineth the stones together, that 

 scarcely instruments with great force can unknit them. 



Also where the water in those valleis can have no such 

 passage away, by the continuance of time in such order 

 as is before rehearsed, the yeerely descent from the 

 mountaines filleth them full, that at the lowest banke of 

 the same, they fall into the valley, and so continue as 

 fishing Ponds or Stagnes in Summer time full of water, 

 and in the Winter hard frosen : as by skarres that 

 remaine thereof in Summer may easily be perceived : so 

 that the heat of Summer is nothing comparable or of 

 force to dissolve the extremitie of cold that commeth in 

 Winter. 



Neverthelesse I am assured that below the force of the 

 frost within the earth, the waters have recourse, and 

 emptie themselves out of sight into the sea, which 

 through the extremitie of the frost are constrained to 

 doe the same : by which occasion the earth within is kept 

 the warmer, and springs have their recourse, which is the Springs nou- 

 onely nutriment of golde and Minerals within the same. nsh & oJd ' 



There is much to be sayd of the commodities of these 

 Countreys, which are couched within the bowels of the 

 earth, which I let passe till more perfect triall be made 

 thereof. 



229 



