[ *8 ] 



At all events, Patrick's thermometer muft have been made 

 under Dr. Halley's inflection ; and would he have permitted it 

 to be marked for 88 degrees of N. latitude, according to Captain 

 }ohnfon's voyage, if he had difbelieved his narrative ? 



My third and laft inftance, from any printed authority, but in 

 a book which is not commonly to be met with, is that of Cap- 

 tain Alexander Cluny, as by a map, engraved under his direction,, 

 the very fpot is marked to the Weflward of Spitzbergen, and 

 in fomewhat more than 82 degrees of N. latitude, where fie faw 

 neither land nor ice r . 



Before I proceed, however, to ftate feveral other inftances of 

 reaching high Northern latitudes, which have never appeared in 

 print, and which I have collected fince my laft paper on this head, 

 I muff, beg the indulgence of the Society, whilft I lay before 

 them fome additional reafons why the Polar feas may be con- 

 ceived to be navigable \ 



Speculative geographers have fuppofed, that there mould be 

 nearly the fame quantity of land and fea in both hemifpheres, in 

 order to preferve the equilibrium of the globe. 



' See the American Traveller^ London, 1769, quarto; as alfo, the 

 Sieur de Vaugondy's EJfai d'wie Carte Polaire Artiique, pubiifhed in 1 774; 

 in which, however, he lays down this fpot from Cluny's map in little 

 more than 81, whereas it is fully in 82- The longitude of this fpot is 30. 

 degrees E. from Fero. 



s I have received a letter from the Rev. Mr. Tooke, Chaplain to. 

 the Factory at St. Peterfburg, dated December 30, 1774, which he 

 concludes in the following manner : " I have a fact or two to communi- 

 " cate, which feem to indicate, if not to a certainty, yet at leafl to a 

 " degree of probability, that the fea is open to the Pole the year through - 

 " out; but my paper will not hold them." From the accuracy with 

 which feveral other interefting particulars are ftated in this letter, I 

 have great reafon to regret, that I have not an opportunity of laying 

 the facts alluded to before^ the Public, with all their circumftances, 

 as I fuppofe that Mr* Tooke's information came from Archangel 

 feamen. 



It 



