56 GEOGEAPHICAL POSITIONS. 



with only two Greenland men and four women, M. Graah reached an island, in latitude 

 '65° 18'', longitude, computed, 38° 27' ; he proceeded onward until stopped by an insur- 

 mountable barrier of ice, and was forced to return to the S.W. 



All the coast appeared to be colder, more barren, and miserable, than the western coast. 

 " It may be said to consist of one uninterrupted glacier, exhibiting only a few patches of 

 vegetation, generally on the banks of the rivers, and elsewhere, often advancing into the 

 sea, and forming promontories of ice, w^hich are passed with so much the more danger 

 that they frequently fall in avalanches." During the whole sunmier of 1829 there was 

 not one day which could be called wsirm ; and, before the 14th of June, the thermometer 

 had never risen above 63°. 



During his last stay, in 1831, Capt. Graah determined the longitudes of the two southern 

 Danish settlements, Julianeshudb and Nomortdlic, with great precision, by means of 

 occultations of fixed stars, &c. ; and we also gained, b}' his observations, the positions of 

 Cape Farewell, never before ascertained, and Cape Christiati, another promontory of the 

 same island. 



The Eastern Coast is diatinguished by the name of the late excellent Kwf/ Frederick VI. 



3. Labrador. — The Eastern Coast of Labrador was surveyed by the Newfoundland 

 siirvey party under Commanders Chimrao and Maxwell. It was an arduous undertaking, 

 on account of the shortness of the navigable season. 



4. Newfoundland. — The work of the survej'ors in recent years has placed the coast of 

 the island in a much more satisfactory light to the navigator. Previously, great errors 

 existed. The assigned positions of Cape Bonavista is an evidence of the uncertainty 

 which existed in the longitudes of the old surveys. The first sheet of the survey by 

 Messrs. Holbrook and Bullock, in 1817, made the long. 52° 59' 15". In the re-issue, 

 shortly afterwards, of the same sheet, it was shifted to long. 53° 8' 20", or 9° 5' farther 

 West. In the modern siu-vey it is placed in 53° 4' 35". 



The coasts to the northward appear to have been given much more to the toestward. 

 It is necessary to notice these discrepancies here, although the amoimts of differences, 

 as now settled, are not important to the general navigator. 



The exact longitude was determined by the Electric Telegraph connecting Ireland 

 with Heart's Content in Trinity Bay in 1867, and from this the principal meridian has 

 been deduced. The Admiralty Sui'vey takes the Chain Rock Battery, on the North side 

 of the entrance of St. John's Harbour, as the meridian. 



5. The West Coast of Newfoundland is still represented according to the surveys of 

 the circumnavigator. Captain James Cook, and Michael Lane, at the latter part of the 

 eighteenth century. The original charts of the West and South Coasts were pubKshed by 

 Mr. Laurie's predecessors, and it will be seen, upon comparison, that the positions 

 given in Cook's first work are still found to be near the truth. 



The Variation of the Compass is decreasing on the Coasts of Iceland, at the rate of about 

 5^' per annum. It is nearly stationary on the Coasts of Newfoundland and Labrador. 



