63 



and know, we may venture to contemplate a scene so 

 vast, nor hazard the imputation, though w e indulge in 

 extravagant conjecture, of exceeding the bounds of 

 reality. 



Let us now suppose that the earth with its axis was 

 changed from north and south, to east and west ; and 

 that the sun passed immediately over the two poles of 

 the earth, upon an unknown meridian. The result, 

 we mast readily believe, would have been the certain 

 and inconceivably rapid dissolution of those immense 

 hemispheres of ice. For as soon as the sun had miti- 

 gated the intensity of the cold, and, by its genial in- 

 fluence, softened the temperature of those cheerless 

 regions, the yielding ice, in gushing torrents, must 

 have rushed, in wild confusion, from their glassy sum- 

 mits, and sought a wonted level in the neighbouring 

 deep. In a few short days the atmosphere at the 

 poles must have become heated, and the melting of the 

 ices general ; while each pole was changed into an 

 almost boundless fountain, pouring, incessantly, its 

 mighty waters into the adjacent seas. 



I shall now, at least for a while, confine my remarks 

 more particularly to a view of the north pole. 



From this pole, there are but two outlets ; the one 

 into the Pacific ocean, through the comparatively nar- 

 row channel at Bheering's straits ; the other, through 

 an immense channel into the Atlantic ocean, betwe n 

 the coast of Greenland, and north cape on the northern, 

 coast of Lapland. These two outlets are situated al- 

 most diametrically opposite to each other on the two 



