THE WHITE SEA. 



349 



which it is distiiiguishcd by the parallelism of its ba3'8 and estuaries, a salient 

 feature of North llussian g-eograph}'. 



The White Sea, with an area of from 47,000 to 48,000 square miles, must in 

 many respects be considered as a lake, or rather a group of lakes, communicating 

 with the Frozen Ocean. The narrow entrance rounding the Lapland coast, 

 while clianging it to a saline gulf, has preserved its independent character in the 

 aspect and outlines of its shores and the relief of its bed. Thus the White Sea 

 is deeper than the ocean with which it is now connected, falling from about 170 

 feet at its entrance to over 1,000 feet towards the extremity of the Kandalaksha 



Fig. 184.— White Sea. 

 Scale 1 : 5,200,000. 



55 to 110 



Fathoms. 

 50 Miles. 



Gulf. The Gulf of Onega, which, like its namesake of the Neva basin, might 

 almost be called Lake Onega, is somewhat shallow, being no more than 260 feet 

 deep, and is separated by the Solovetzkiy Isles from the main basin. When the 

 White Sea was a lake, like Ladoga and Onega, it was probably at a higher level 

 than at present, and drained to the Polar Sea through a river forming a continua- 

 tion of the Upper Dvina. But oscillations of level may have caused the sea to 

 burst into the lacustrine basin, converting its fluvial outflow into a strait. The 

 elevation of the entrance prevents the sand and mud from being carried seawards, 

 and the basin is being slowly filled by the continuous deposits of the rivers, so 



