172 ACCOUNT OF THE ARCTIC REGIONS. 



tents of these two extremes, do not differ above one- 

 eightli part of the whole. 



As it is not my intention to consider the hy- 

 drography of the globe, but only that of a small 

 portion of it, called the Greenland Sea, I shall 

 proceed to state the limits under which this part of 

 the Arctic Ocean is comprised. 



According to a section of a public statute, intend- 

 ed for the regulation of the Northern AVh ale-fish- 

 eries, the Greenland Sea commences with the pa- 

 rallel of 59° 30' of north latitude * included be- 

 tween Europe and America, and extends as far to- 

 wards the Pole as can be navigated. In general 

 language, however, among the whalers, the sea ad- 

 joining Spitzbergen, in which the first considerable 

 whale-fishery was conducted, together with the is- 

 lands in this quarter, receive more particularly the 

 title of Greenla7id ; while the sea to tlie west- 

 ward of Old Greenland, Hudson's and Baffin's Bays 

 excepted, maintains the name of Davis' Straits. 



In the Spitzbergen quarter, the hydrography of 



surface of the sea, (into which had been poured the water from 

 snow and ice, melted in consequence of a summer's heat,) was 

 observed by Captain Ross to be of as low a specific gravity as 

 1.020; and the specific gravity of the water of the Baltic Sea, 

 is stated at 1.014. — (Annals of Phil. vol. vii. p. 42.) In the 

 Mediterranean, however, the specific gravity of the water ap- 

 pears to be greater than that of the ocean. — (Annals of Phil, 

 vol. iv. p. 206.) 



* 26th Geo. III. cap. 41. § l6. 



