264 ACCOUNT or *rHE arctic regions. 



lakes, telling woods, and cultivating the earth : but 

 here is an occurrence, if indeed true, the reverse of 

 cammon experience, concerning the causes of which 

 it is not easy to oflfer any conjecture. 



Another alteration in the position of the Green- 

 land ice, of little importance, however, compared 

 with the above, took place since the year 1815 ; a 

 body of about 2000 square leagues of ice, having 

 drifted out of the Greenland Sea, from between the 

 parallels of 74' and 80°. This dispersion of ice, 

 however great as it appears to be, is probably only 

 temporary ; and may, in a very few years, nay, in a 

 season or two, be entirely replaced. 



With each recurring spring, the north Polar 

 ice presents the following general outline. Filling 

 the bays of Hudson and Baffin, as well as the straits 

 of Hudson and part of that of Davis, it exhibits an 

 irregular waving, but generally continuous line, from 

 Newfoundland or Labrador, to Nova Zenibla. 



From Newfoundland it extends in a northerly di- 

 rection, along the Labrador shore, generally pre- 

 venting all access to the land, as high as the mouth 

 of Hudson's Strait ; then turning to the north-east- 

 ward, forms a bay near the coast of Greenland, in 

 latitude, perhaps, 66° or 67°, by suddenly passing 

 away to the southward, to the extremity of Green- 

 land. The quantity of ice on the east side of Davis' 

 Strait, being often small, the continuity of its bor- 

 der is liable to be broken, so as to admit of ships 



