■h ACCOUNT OF THE ARCTIC REGIONS. 



Cliina. Among these arguments, I shall only men- 

 tion tlie nature of the currents and tides, — the fact 

 of an amazing body of jce being yearly dissolved in 

 the Greenland sea, above what is there generated, 



the common occurrence of drift wood, and some 



of it worm-eaten, in most parts of the Polar seas, — 

 the nature of the northern termination of the con- 

 tinents of Europe and Asia, as well as that of Ame- 

 rica, as far as yet ascertained, — and the facts of 

 whales having passed from the Greenland sea to 

 the Sea of Tartary, and from remote regions in the 

 north, to the sea of Greenland ; all of which cir- 

 cumstances I conceive to be in favour of the exist- 

 ence of such a communication. 



1 . The prevailing cuiTent in the Spitzbergen sea, 

 flows, we are well assured, during nine months of the 

 year, if not all the year round, fi-om the north-east 

 towards tlie south-west. The velocity of this cur- 

 rent may be from 5 to 20 miles per day, vai-ying in 

 dilTerent situations, but is most considerable near 

 the coast of Old Greenland *. The current, on the 

 other hand, in the middle of Behring's Strait, as 

 observed by Lieutenant Kotzcbue, sets strongly to 

 tiic north-east, vdth a velocity, as he thought, of 

 two miles and a half an hour, which is greater. 



* As the proofs of this current will be brought forward 

 under the division of the FJydrography of the Polar Seas, it is 

 needless in this place to enter into particulars. 



