GREENLAND. 
269 
There seems every probability that the country is covered 
with one continuous almost level field of ice, concealing or ob- 
literating all indications of hill and valley, without a single 
break, for upwards of twelve hundred miles from north to 
south, and four hundred from east to west. Its thickness is 
unknown ; but when it is remembered that every square mile 
contains six hundred and forty acres, that the weight of an 
inch of rain is upwards of one hundred tons per acre, and that, 
even exclusive of the pressure, the specific gravity of ice is 
about eight-ninths of that of water, it will be seen that the 
unbroken ice-field of Greenland must have an area of upwards 
of three hundred million acres, and a weight of more than 
twenty-seven thousand million tons for every inch of its thick- 
ness. 
From the facts that ice-bergs are rare on the east coast, and 
that no stones or other indications of land are found on the 
surface of the ice-field, it is thought probable that there is no 
high land in the interior, but that the ice slopes continuously 
from east to west ; and as the surface of the vast accumulation 
of ice in the known interior, so far from anywhere attaining 
the height of the circumscribing land, can only be seen by 
climbing to considerable elevations on the latter, it is believed 
by Dr. Brown that the bare surface of the country, were its 
glacial covering removed, would resemble a huge shallow vessel 
with high walls around it — a vessel now filled with ice, which 
slowly flows off, in the form of glaciers, through the enormous 
lips in the zone of mountain-land forming its rim. Dr. Brown 
is of opinion that a great inlet once stretched across the island 
from Jakobshavn ice-fjord, as represented on the old maps, but 
that it is now choked up with consolidated bergs. 
It can scarcely be doubted that, in the course of ages, the 
glaciers, slowly travelling seaward, grind down the bottoms of 
the valleys to the sea-level, and thus convert the valleys them- 
selves into fjords, such as are so prevalent on the coasts of 
northern countries in general. When a glacier reaches the 
sea, it grooves its way along the submarine bottom for a con- 
siderable distance — in some instances upwards of a mile — until 
it is stopped by the buoying action of the water, through which, 
and not the force of gravity, a portion is ultimately broken off 
and an ice-berg is formed. “ The ice,” says Dr. Brown, “ groans 
and creaks, then there is a crashing, then a roar like the discharge 
of a park of artillery, and with a monstrous regurgitation of 
waves, felt far from the scene of disturbance, the ice-berg is 
launched into life.” Some of the bergs may be seen sailing 
majestically in long lines out of the ice-fjords, to be wafted 
in various directions by the winds and currents. Some of 
them ground near the fjords, where they remain for months 
