176 STUDIES OF NATURE. 



renovate the waters of the Sea, comprehended be- 

 tween our Continent and that of America, the 

 projeding and retreating parts of which have, be- 

 fides, a mutual correfpondence, hke the banks of 

 a river. 



It may be remarked, at firft fight, on a map of 

 the World, that the bed of the Atlantic Ocean, 

 becomes narrower and narrower toward the North, 

 and widens toward the South ; and that the pro- 

 minent part of Africa correfponds to that great 

 retreating part of America, at the bottom of which 

 is fituated the Gulf of Mexico ; as the prominent 

 part of South America correfponds to the vaft 

 Gulf of Guinea ; fo that this bafon has, in it's 

 configuration, the proportions, the finuofities, the 

 fource, and the mouth, of a vaft fluviatic channel. 



Let us now obferve, that the ices and fnows 

 form, in the month of January, on our Hemi- 

 fphere, a cupola, the arch of which extends more 

 than two thoufand leagues over the two Conti- 

 nents, with a thickncfs of fome lines in Spain, of 

 fome inches in France, of fevcîal feet in Germany, 

 of feveral fathoms in Ruffia, and of fome hundreds 

 of feet beyond the fixtieth degree of Latitude, fuch 

 as the ices which Henry Eilis *, and other Naviga- 



* Ellis's Voyage to Hudfon's-Eay. 



tors 



