lôO STUDIES OF KATURE. 



leagues an hour. He compares it to the iluice of 

 a mill. He remarked that the lurface of the wa- 

 ter was there very fmooth, which puzzled him ex- 

 ceedingl)'^, by damping his hope of a communica- 

 tion between this Bay and the South-Sea. He re- 

 mained, neverthelefs, convinced of the exiftence 

 of fuch a paflage ; fuch is the pertinacity of Man 

 in favour of pre-conceived opinions, in the very 

 face of evidence. 



John Hugiiez de Linfchottetu a Dutchman, had 

 made nearly the fame remarks on the currents of 

 the northern Tides of Europe *, when he was at 

 Wai gats Strait, at 70^ 20' North Latitude. In the 

 two voyages which that exaâ: Obferver made to 

 this Strait, in 1594 and 1595, undertaken in the 

 view of difcovering a paflage to China by the 

 North of Europe, he repeated the fame obferva- 

 tions : " We obferved," fays he, " once more, 

 " from the courfe of the tide, what we had al- 

 *' ready remarked with much exadnefs, that it 

 " comes from the Eaft." He likewife obferved, 

 that there the water was brackilh, or half fait; 

 this heafcribes to the fufion of a prodigious quan- 

 tity of floating ice, which flopped his paflage at 

 Waigats Strait ; for the ice formed even of fea- 



' * See the firft and fécond Voyages to Waigats, by H. J. Lin- 

 /(hotten. Voyages to the North, vol. iv. page 204. 



water 



