THE SECRET OF THE NORTH POLE. IO5 



which was very significant. The tides ebbed and 

 flowed in it. Only one fact we know of a fact to 

 be presently discussed throws so much light on the 

 question we are considering as this circumstance does. 

 Let us consider a little whence these tidal waves can 

 have come. 



The narrow straits between Greenland on the one 

 side, and Ellesmere Land and Grrinnell Land on the 

 other, are completely ice-bound. We cannot suppose 

 that the tidal wave could have found its way beneath 

 such a barrier as this. ' I apprehend,' says Captain 

 Maury, ' that the tidal wave from the Atlantic can 

 no more pass under this icy barrier, to be propagated 

 in the seas beyond, than the vibrations of a musical 

 string can pass with its notes a fret on which the 

 musician has placed his finger.' 



Are we to suppose, then, that the tidal waves were 

 formed in the very sea in which they were seen 

 by Kane and Hayes? This is Captain Maury's 

 opinion : * These tides,' says he, ' must have been 

 born in that cold sea, having their cradle about the 

 North Pole.' 



But if we carefully consider the theory of the tides, 

 this opinion seems inadmissible. Every considera- 

 tion on which that theory is founded is opposed to 

 the assumption that the moon could by any possi- 

 bility raise tides in an arctic basin of limited extent. 

 It would be out of place to examine at length the 

 principle on which the formation of tides depends. It 

 will be sufficient for our purposes to remark that it is 



