8 ACCOUNT OF THE ARCTIC REGIONS. 



land into Davis' Straits, or to tlie east coast of 

 Greenland, in direct opposition to a current which 

 perpetually fiov/s towards the south-west *. 



4. The northern faces of the continents of Eu- 

 rope and Asia, as well as of that of America, so far as 

 yet known, are such, as renders it difficult, even to 

 imagine such a position for the unascertained regions, 

 as to cut off the communication between the frozen 

 sea, near the meridian of London, and that in the 

 opposite part of the northern hemisphere, near Beh- 

 ring's Strait. 



5. And, another argument which goes still far- 

 ther to support the opinion of the existence of the 

 communication in question, is the fact of whales 

 which have been harpooned in the Greenland seas, 

 having been found in the Pacific Ocean ; and whales 

 with stone lances sticking in their fat, (a kind of 

 weapon used by no nation now^ known,) having been 

 caught both in the sea of Spitzbergen, and in Davis' 

 Strait. The following are some of the authorities 

 for this fact, which, of all other arguments yet of- 

 fered in favour of a trans-polar passage, seems to me 

 to be the most satisfactory. 



A Dutch East India captain, of the name of 

 Jacob Cool, of Sardam, who had been several times 

 at Greenland, and was of couise well acquainted with 

 the nature of the apparatus used in the whale-. 



* Quarterly Revie^.v, No, 36. p. 445. 



