[ i* 1 



the form of ice 1 ? Can it be contended, that ten degrees of the 

 globe round each pole were covered with frozen fea at the 

 original creation a ? And if this is not infifted upon, can it be 

 fuppofed, that, when the furface of the Polar ocean firft ceafed to 

 be liquid, it could have afterwards refilled the effedts of winds, 

 currents, and tides ? 



I beg leave alio to rely much upon the neceflity of the ice's 

 yielding to the conftant reciprocation of the latter; becaufe no. 

 fea was ever known to be frozen but the Black Sea, and fome 

 imall parts of the Baltic b , neither of which have any tides, 

 at the fame time that the waters of both contain much 

 lefs fait than thofe of other feas, from the great influx of 

 many frefh water rivers. For this laft reafon, it may likewife 



7 - " There are three kinds of ice in the Northern feas. The firft is 

 61 like melted mow which is become partly hardened, is more eafily 

 *' broken into pieces, lefs tranfparent, is feldom more than fix inches 

 " thick, and when diliblved, is found to be intermixed with fait. This 

 " firft fort of ice is the only one which is ever formed from fea water. 



" If a certain quantity of water, which contains as much fait as fea 

 u water, is expofed to the greateft degree of cold, it never becomes firm 

 £< and pure ice, but refembles tallow, or fuet, whilft it preferves the 

 ' c tafte of fait, fo that the fweet tranfparent ice can never be formed in 

 " the fea. If the ice of the fea itfelf, therefore, confined in a fmall 

 { t veflel without any motion, cannot thus become true ice, much lefs can 

 " it do fo in a deep and agitated ocean." The author hence infers, 

 that all the floating ice in the Polar feas comes from the Tartarian 

 rivers and Greenland, as I have before contended. See a Diftertation 

 of Michel Lomonofof, tranflated from the Swedifti Tranfadtions of 1752. 

 ColletJim Jcddemique, Tom. XI. p. 5. & fcq. Paris, 1772, quarto. 

 The Diftertation is entitled, " De VOrigine des Monls de Glace, dans la 

 Met du Nord." 



1 If there had been a fixed barrier of "ice from the time of the crea- 

 tion, extending from 80 1 to the North Pole, the height of fuch ice muft 

 have been exceffive, by the accumulation of frozen ihow from winter to 

 winter. Martens therefore obferves, that the ice mountains in Spitzbergen 

 are conftantly encreafing by the fnow and rain which falls freezing, and 

 which feldom melts at the top, p. 43. 



b To thefe perhaps may be added the White Sea. 



be 



