262, STUDIES OF NATURE. 



year round, if wc may believe the teftimony of 

 every Navigator. They do not, in truth, come 

 from the South-Pole ; for if it were fo, no veflel 

 could ever double Cape Horn ; but they come 

 from the extremity of Magellan's Land, which is 

 evidently bent backward, with relation to the 

 fliores of the South Sea. 



The ices of the Poles, then, renovate the waters 

 of the Sea, as the ices of mountains renovate thofe 

 of the great rivers. Thefe effufions of the polar 

 ices prefs toward the Line, from the adlion of the 

 Sun, who is inceffantly pumping up the waters of . 

 the Sea, in the torrid Zone, and determines, by 

 this diminution of bulk, the waters of the Poles 

 to ruQi thitherward. This is the firft caufe of the 

 motion of the South Seas, as has been already ob- 

 ferved. It would appear highly probable, that 

 the polar effufions are proportioned to the evapo- 

 rations of the Ocean. But without lofing fight of 

 the leading obje6t of our enquiry, we fliall examine 

 for what reafon Nature has taken ftill greater care 

 to cool the Seas, than the Land, of the torrid 

 Zone : for it merits attention, that not only the 

 polar Winds v/hich blow there, but moft of the 

 rivers which empty themfelves into the South Seas, 

 have their fources in icy mountains, fuch as the 

 !^ara, the Amazon, the Oroonoko, &c. 



The 



