Of the Nature of the Climate, and the Temperament of the Air.

THE natives of Greenland have no reason to complain of rains and stormy weather, which seldom trouble them; especially in the Bay of Disco, in the 68th degree of Latitude, where they commonly have clear and settled weather during the whole summer season: but again, when foul and stormy weather falls in, it rages with an incredible fierceness and violence, chiefly when the wind comes about Southerly, or South West; and the storm is laid and succeeded by fair weather as soon as the wind shifts about to the West and North.

The country would be exceeding pleasant and healthful in summer time, if it was not for the heavy fogs that annoy it, especially near the sea coast; for it is as warm here as anywhere, when the air is serene and clear, which happens when the wind blows Easterly; and sometimes it is so hot, that the sea water, which after the ebbing of the sea has remained in the hollow places of the rocks, has often, before night, by the heat of the sun, been found coagulated into a fine white salt. I can remember, that once, for three months together, we had as fair settled weather and warm sunshine days as one could wish, without any rain.

The length of the summer is from the latter end of May to the midst of September; all the remaining part of the year is winter, which is tolerable in the latitude of 64°, but to the Northward, in 68° and above, the cold is so excessive, that even the most spirituous liquors, as French brandy, will freeze near the fire side. At the end of August the sea is all covered with ice, which does not thaw before April or May, and sometimes not till the latter end of June.

It is remarkable, that on the Western coasts of different countries, lying in one and the same latitude, it is much colder than on the Eastern, as some parts of Greenland and Norway. And though Greenland is much colder than Norway, yet the snow never lies so high, especially in the bays and inlets, where it is seldom above half a yard higher than the ground; whereas the inland parts and the mountains are perpetually covered with ice and snow, which never melts; and not a spot of the ground is bare, but near the shore and in the bays; where in the summer you are delighted with a charming verdure, caused by the heat of the sun, reverberated from side to side, and concentred in these lower parts of the valleys, surrounded by high rocks and mountains, for many hours together without intermission; but as soon as the sun is set, the air is changed at once, and the cold ice mountains make you soon feel the nearness of their neighbourhood, and oblige you to put on your furs. Besides the frightful ice that covers the whole face of the land, the sea is almost choaked with it, some flat and large fields of ice, or bay ice, as they call it, and some huge and prodigious mountains, of an astonishing bigness, lying as deep under water as they soar high in the air. These are pieces of the ice mountains of the land, which lie near the sea, and bursting, tumble down into the sea, and are carried off. They represent to the beholders, afar off, many odd and strange figures; some of churches, castles with spires and turrets others you would take to be ships under sail; and many have been deluded by them, thinking they were real ships, and going to board them. Nor does their figure and shape alone surprise, but also their diversity of colours pleases the sight; for some are like white crystal, others blue as sapphires; and others again green as emeralds. One would attribute the cause of these colours to metals or minerals of the places where this ice was formed; or of waters of which it was coagulated: but experience teaches me, that the blue ice is the concretion of fresh water, which at first is white, and at length hardens and turns blue; but the greenish colour comes from salt water. It is observed, that if you put the blue ice near the fire and let it melt, and afterwards remove it to a colder place, to freeze again, it does not recover its former blue, but becomes white. From whence I infer, that the volatile sulphur, which the ice had attracted from the air, by its resolution into water, exhales and vanishes.

Though the summer season is very hot in Greenland, it seldom causes any thunder and lightning; the reason of which I take to be the coolness of the night, which allays the heat of the day, and causes the sulphureous exhalations to fall again with the heavy dew to the ground.

As for the ordinary meteors, commonly seen in other countries, they are visible in Greenland; as the rainbow, flying or shooting stars, and the like. But what is more peculiar to the climate, is the Northern Light, or Aurora Borealis, which in the spring of the year, about the new moon, darts streams of light all over the sky, as quick as lightning, especially if it be a clear night, with such a brightness, that you may read by it as by daylight.

At the summer solstice there is no night, and you have the pleasure to see the sun turn round about the horizon all the twenty-four hours; and in the depth of winter they have but little comfort in that planet, and the nights are proportionally long; yet it never is so dark, but you can see to travel up and down the country, though sometimes it be neither moonshine nor starlight: but the snow and ice, with which both land and sea is covered, enlightens the air; or the reason may be fetched from the nearness of the horizon to the equator.

The temperament of the air is not unhealthful; for, if you except the scurvy and distempers of the breast, they know nothing here of the many other diseases with which other countries are plagued; and these pectoral infirmities are not so much the effects of the excessive cold, as of that nasty foggish weather which this country is very much subject to; which I impute to the vast quantity of ice that covers the land and drives in the sea. From the beginning of April to the end of July is the foggish season, and from that time the fog daily decreases. But as in the summer time they are troubled with the fog, so in the winter season they are likewise plagued with the vapour called frost smoke, which, when the cold is excessive, rises out of the sea as the smoke out of a chimney, and is as thick as the thickest mist, especially in the bays, where there is any opening in the ice. It is very remarkable, that this frost, damp, or smoke, if you come near it, will singe the very skin of your face and hands; but when you are in it, you find no such piercing or stinging sharpness, but warm and soft; only it leaves a white frost upon your hair and clothes.

I must not forget here to mention the wonderful harmony and correspondence which is observed in Greenland between fountains and the main sea, viz. that at spring tides, in new and full moon, when the strongest ebbing is at sea, the hidden fountains or springs of fresh water break out on shore, and discover themselves, often in places where you never would expect to meet with any such; especially in winter, when the ground is covered with ice and snow; yet at other times there are no water springs in those places. The cause of this wonderful harmony I leave to the learned inquiry of natural philosophers; how springs and fountains follow the motion of the main sea, as the sea does that of the moon. Yet this I must observe to you, that some great men have been greatly mistaken, in that they have taken for granted and asserted, that in Norway and Greenland the tide was hardly remarkable. (See Mr. Wollf’s Reasonable Thoughts on the Effects of Nature, p. 541.) Whereas nowhere greater tide is observed; the sea, at new and full moon, especially in the spring and fall, rises and falls about three fathoms.