236 RINK ON ICE OF GREENLAND. chap. xiii. 



under the salt water, grating along the rocky bottom, which 

 they must polish and score at depths of hundreds and even of 

 more than a thousand feet. At length, when there is water 

 enough to float them, huge portions, having broken off, fill 

 BaflSn's Bay with icebergs of a size exceeding any which could 

 be produced by ordinary land glaciers. Stones, sand, and 

 mud are sometimes included in these bergs which float down 

 Bafiin's Bay. At some points, where the ice of the interior of 

 Grreenland reaches the coast, Dr. Eink saw mighty springs 

 of clayey water issuing from under the edge of the ice even 

 in winter, showing the grinding action of the glacial mass 

 mixed with sand, on the subjacent surface of the rocks. 



The "outskirts," where the Danish colonies are stationed, 

 consist of numerous islands, of which Disco Island is the 

 largest, in lat. 70° IST., and of many peninsulas, with fiords 

 from fifty to a hundred miles long, running into the land, 

 and through which the ice above alluded to passes on its 

 way to the bay. This area is 30,000 square miles in extent, 

 and contains in it some mountains 4000 feet to 5000 feet 

 high. The perpetual snow usually begins at the height of 

 2000 feet, below which level the land is for the most part 

 free from snow between June and August, and supports a 

 vegetation of several hundred species of flowering plants, 

 which ripen their seeds before the winter. There are even 

 some places where phenogamous plants have been found at an 

 elevation of 4500 feet; a fact which, when we reflect on the 

 immediate vicinity of so large and lofty a region of conti- 

 nental ice in the same latitude, well deserves the attention of 

 the geologist, who should also bear in mind, that while the 

 Danes are settled to the west in the " outskirts," there exists, 

 due east of the most southern portion of this ice-covered con- 

 tinent, at the distance of about 1200 miles, the home of the 

 Laplanders with their reindeer, bears, wolves, seals, walruses, 

 and cetacea. If, therefore, there are geological grounds for 



