ic e . tilde, the whole land is covered-with eternal fnow to the Ihores or
the lea, in the months o f December and January, correlponding to
our June and July ■ every unprejudiced reader will find it neceffary
to allow the temperature o f the Southern hemilphere, to be remarkably
colder than that of the Northern; and no one will, I believe,
for the future, venture to queftion this curious fa£t in the Natural
Hiflory o f our Globe..
But, as the inquifitive reader may require o f me a folution ,of
this curious and difficult phenomenon, I will venture to deliver
my opinion on the fubjedt; and hope, that i f it prove not entirely fa-
tisfadtory, it may, however, contribute towards an explanation or
many things, which perhaps were not before confidered in this:
point o f view. Having maturely confidered every circumftance, I
find that, with other caufes founded on the apparent motion o f the
fun, the abfence o f land in the high latitudes o f the Southern he-
mifphere, creates this material difference in the temperature o f the
air, between the correfponding degrees o f latitude in the Arftic and
the Antarctic hemilpheres.
In the Ar ftic regions, from 6o* to 661- degrees and upwards, there
is much land to be met with, viz. Iceland, Spitzbergen, the North
o f Norway and Sweden, all Lapland, all the Northern parts of
European and Afiatic Ruffia : beyond its Eaftern extremities in
Kamtchatka, are thole numerous iiles lately difcovered by the
Ruffians,
Ruffians,; and the lands o f North-America, about Hudfon’s and
■ Baffin’s Bay; and lift o f all, New and Old Greenland. Some of
•thefe .lands are inhabited, and even cultivated, and bear various
kinds of fruit and corn ; and, during the ffiort fummers they enjoy,
there is fometimes an intenfe heat, very little inferior to that between
the Tropics. Let us now compare this with our experience in
the Antardtic hemifphere. We found no land wherever we failed,
.about 6o° and upwards to the South, except the two little fpots in
.the Southern Atlantic ocean: Th e thermometer, in the height o f
iummer, in thefe high latitudes, was never five degrees above the
freezing point, and we faw it frequently pointing below it. We
often had fnow and fleet, and found our water in the Ikuttled water-
cafk on deck, frozen during feme nights. I f all this happen in the
midft o f fummer, what muff the condition o f thefe climates be
during winter.? Th e accounts o f the Spanifh*, Dutch -)-, French J,
and cfpecially of our Englilh § navigators, relative' to the temperature
of the Auftral regions about Patagonia, Tierra del Fuego,
Falkland’s Iilands, and the neighbouring leas, perfedtly correfpond
with our experience. And in the Falkland’s Iflands, the thermo-
O 2 - meter,
* Amerigo Vcfpucci, 3d Voyage. Garcia Nodal. Sanniento.
-}- ~R6ggcwcin, Recucil des Voyages pour 1’ Etabliilemeiw des Indes Orientates. tom. 4.
t Bougainville, M. de Gcnnes, Frezier, Bcauchcine Gouin, Bouvet.
§ Drake, Cavendifli, Sharp, Sir John Narborough, Wood, Woods Rogers, Haller,
Anfon, -&c. &c.