They name a hill, a river, or a fall, but do not deal in
generics. Some _a priori_ reasoning seems constrained, where the facts
are granted, as this: All animals at Nova Zembla, it is said, are
carnivorous, because there is no grass.
_12th_. Snow covers everything. We are shut out from the civilized
world, and thrown entirely on our own resources. I doubt, if we were in
Siberia, or Kamschatka, if we could be so completely isolated.
_13th_. Ellis, in one of his northern voyages, asserts the opinion that
the northern lights kindle and disperse the vapors requisite to the
formation of lightning. Hence there is no thunder in high northern
latitudes. We admit the fact, but doubt the reasoning. Vapor is but
water in a gaseous state. It is a fine medium for the exhibition of
electricity, and we cannot say that electricity exists without it.
_14th_. When Lucas Fox sailed to discover the north-west passage to
India, in 1631, he carried a letter from Charles the First to the
Emperor of Japan. Such was public information, in Europe, twenty-two
years after the discovery of the River Hudson, and the settlement of New
England, eleven years later.
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