THE EARTH. 197 



we know, but the ice in those regions has stopped 

 our inquiries. Although the ocean, properly 

 speaking, is but one extensive sheet of waters, 

 continued over every part of the globe, without 

 interruption, and although no part of it is divided 

 from the rest, yet geographers have distinguished 

 it by different names ; as the Atlantic or Western 

 Ocean, the Northern Ocean, the Southern Ocean, 

 the Pacific Ocean, and the Indian Ocean. Others 

 have divided it differently, and given other names ; 

 as the Frozen Ocean, the Inferior Ocean, or the 

 American Ocean. But all these being arbitrary 

 distinctions, and not of nature's making, the 

 naturalist may consider them with indifference. 



In this vast receptacle, almost all the rivers of 

 the earth ultimately terminate : nor do such great 

 supplies seem to increase its stores ; for it is nei- 

 ther apparently swollen by their tribute, nor di- 

 minished by their failure ; it still continues the 

 same. Indeed, what is the quantity of water of 

 all the rivers and lakes in the world, compared to 

 that contained in this great receptacle ?* If we 

 should offer to make a rude estimate, we shall find 

 that all the rivers in the world, flowing into the 

 bed of the sea, with a continuance of their pre- 

 sent stores, would take up at least eight hundred 

 years to fill it to its present height. For, sup- 

 posing the sea to be eighty-five millions of square 

 miles in extent, and a quarter of a mile upon an 

 average in depth, this, upon calculation, will give 

 above twenty-one millions of cubic miles of water, 



* Buffon, vol. ii. p. 70. 



