ICE AT THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA. 175 



snow to the depth of about ten inches had fallen. But on the day in ques- 

 tion the air was calm and the sky serene, with a brilliant and warm sun. I 

 was to dine with the Mayor, Mr. Ephraim Pound, but in making calls upon 

 friends noon found me at the base of the mountains; and since Mr. Pound 

 lived in the eastern part of the city, I faced about towards the east, but 

 with bewilderment and astonishment I there saw not only the "foot hills" 

 of the mountains, but mountain ridge rising after and above mountain 

 ridge, until finally the whole was surmounted by the Snowy Eange. At 

 first the image seemed near, rising from the eastern limits of the town, but 

 it soon receded and became fainter. When I reached Mr. Pound's, it was 



r 



apparently eastward of that remarkable basaltic bute called Yalmont. I 

 called the household to come and look at it, but it rapidly vanished, appear- 

 ing towards the last like a line of faint cumulus clouds stretched along the 

 margin of the eastern horizon. 



On several occasions, while in deep mountain canyons, I saw portions 

 of the Snowy Eange, with all the intervening mountains mirrored on the 

 eastern sky, when the canyon walls cut oif all view of mountains at the 

 point where I w&s.— American Meteorologist, March, 1877. 



ICE AT THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA. 



Professor Hind, of St. John, N. B., in a recent paper addressed to his 

 government gives a description of the remarkable effect of " anchor ice " on 

 the coast of New Poundland. It is thus summarized by a correspondent of 

 the Toronto Globe : Anchor ice is a form of ice which occurs both in fresh 

 and sea water, and is known to the Germans under the name of " Grrundeis," 

 to the French Canadians under that of "frazoo," and to the old sedentary 

 seal hunters under the name of " lolly." Anchor ice forms in rapid rivers, 

 and has not unfrequently been described. It is, however, on the borders of 

 the Arctic current, where sea water rapidly cools in the fall of the year, 

 along our coasts that anchor ice manifests itself in a peculiar manner. 



During the first cold snap, at the beginning of winter, say towards the 

 middle of November and early in December, the sedentary sealers often had 

 small spieulag, or needles of ice, formed on the corks of their seal nets, 

 which are set in eight, ten, and sometimes fifteen fathoms of water. If the 

 seal nets are not soon taken up when the corks near the bottom begin to 

 show ice needles forming about them they are liable to be lost. The spiculse 

 accumulate very rapidly, and, being lighter than water, they will enable the 

 corks to raise the whole net to the surface, and if the anchors are not " fro- 

 zen to the bottom of the sea" the net is liable to be drifted away by the 

 tides. It sometimes happens that the anchors of seal nets are frozen to the 

 bottom, and when forcibly detached they bring up masses of frozen sand, 

 and this from a depth of fifty and sometimes seventy feet below the bottom 

 of the sea ; in other words, the " bottom of the sea is frozen." 



