306 I. I. Hayes on the Practicability 
The northern coasts of Asia, Europe and America, have been 
determined with reliable accuracy ; but whether the Russians are 
correct in their belief in the existence of a great continent lying 
to the northward of Asia, or whether the:Archipelago to the 
northward of America continues even to the Pole, we do not 
though the position and movements of this ice barrier are 
well known to the members—having been so frequently defined 
— ssi nevertheless thought it necessary briefly to sketch its 
tline 
e, its outlin 
able with the remarkable curve of the Greenland current; thence 
along the coast southward, it rounds Cape Farewell, and spring 
ing over the Greenland sea to Nova Zembla, it invests sometimes 
Iceland and Jan Mayen; thence eastward along the coast of Asia, 
it joins America over the Strait of Behring; and still following 
‘slosely the tortuosities of the shore line, it dips down into Hud- 
’s Bay. 
y . 
The area Nd ME this irregular ice coast-line, is not far 
ie : 
s is not, however, one continuous ice margin, but its sou 
ce . 
outline, penctrable at many points; 
