GREENLAND OR POLAR ICE. 



On the growth of Icebergs formed on the sea. 



As the difference in the appearance of the ice 

 of fields, and of that formed in places within our 

 observation, seems to require the deposition of 

 moisture from the atmosphere for explaining the 

 phenomenon ; so, the similarity of the ice of bergs 

 with that of fields, (whether generated in bays of 

 the land, or in regions nearer the Pole), is a rea- 

 son for admitting the operation of the same causes 

 in their production. If we can conceive, from the 

 before-mentioned process of the enlargement of 

 fields by the addition of the annually deposited 

 humidity, that a few years are sufficient for the 

 production of considerable fields of ice, What 

 must be the effect of fifty or sixty centuries af- 

 fording an annual increase in undisturbed secu- 

 rity ? 



If, therefore, we add to the precipitations from 

 the atmosphere, the stores supplied by the sea, and 

 allow the combination of these two by the agency 

 of an intense frost, and conceive also a state of qui- 

 escence, for the operation of these causes, secured 

 for ages, the question of the mode of production 

 of the most enormous ice mountains §eems to have 

 a sufficient solution. 



Loose icebergs, it has been observed, are but 

 sparingly disseminated in the Greenland Seas, but 

 in Davis' Straits they abound in astonishing pro- 

 fusion. Setting constantly towards the south, they 

 ^re scattered abroad to an amazing extent. The 



