STUDY IV. Tf^ 



in my opinion, the bed of the travellers who have 

 made obfervations on it, fays, in his excellen trea- 

 tife on winds, and tides : * " Bays fcarcely have 

 " any currents, or if there be fuch a thing, they 

 *' are only counter-currents running from one 

 ** point to another." He quotes many obferva- 

 tions, in proof of this, and many others, of a fimilar 

 nature, are found fcattered over the journals of 

 other Navigators. Though he has treated only of 

 the Currents between the Tropics, and even that 

 with feme degree of obfcurity, we fhall proceed 

 to generalize this principle, and to apply it to the 

 principal bays of Continents. 



I reduce to two general Currents, thofe of the 

 Ocean. Both of thefe proceed from the Poles, and 

 are produced, in my opinion, by the alternate fu- 

 fion of their ices. Though this be not the place 

 to examine the caufe of it, to me it appears fo na- 

 tural, fo new, and of fuch curious inveftigation, 

 that the Reader, I flatter myfelf, will not be angry 

 with me, if I give him an idea of it, on my way. 



The Poles appear to me the fources of the Sea, 

 as the icy mountains are the fources of the princi- 

 pal rivers. It is, if 1 am not miftaken, the fnow 

 and the ice which cover our Pole, that annually 



* Vol. ii, page 385. 



renovate 



