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Show [ 170 ] In filent herds the wondering fea-calves lave, Or nod their {limy foreheads o'er the wave ; Poifed on :fiill wing attentive vultures fweep, And winking crocodiles are lull' d to Deep. Where leads the northern Star his lucid train High o'er the fnow-clad earth, and icy n1ain, With milky light the white horizon ftreams, 3 6 5 And to the moon each fparkling mountain gleanlS.Slow o'er the printed fnows with filent walk Huge :fhaggy forms acrofs the twilight fialk ; And ever and anon with hideous found Burfi the thick ribs of ice, and thunder round.- 3 70 There, as old Winter flaps his hoary wing, And lingering leaves his empire to the Spring, Pierced with quick fhafts of filver-ihooting light Fly in dark troops the dazled irnps of night.--- Burjl the thick ribs of icc. I. 370. The violent cracks of ice heard from the Glacie rs fcem to be caufed by fome of the fnow being melted in the middle of the day ; and the water thus produced ru nning down into valli es of icc, and congealing again in a few hours, forces off by its expanfi.on large p recipices from the icc-mountains. ( 171 ) " A wake, rny Love!" enamour' d M uscHus cries, " Stretch thy fair lirnbs, refulgent Maid arife ; " Ope thy fwect eye-lids to the ri.G.ng ray, " And hail with ruby lips returning day. " Down the white hills diifolving torrents pour, 375 " Green fprings the turf, and purple blows the flower; " His torpid wing the Rail exulting tries, '' Mounts the foft gale, and wantons in the :fkies · ' " Rife, let us mark how bloorn the awaken'd groves, " And 'mid the banks of rofes hide our loves." M_ufchus. 1. 375· Corallinus, or lichen rangiferinus. Coral-mofs. C landefl:inemamage .. This ~of: vegetates. beneath the fnow, where the degree of heat is always about 40, that Is, In. the middle between the freezing point, and the common l1 eat o~ the earth;. and IS for many mo?ths of the wint~T the fole food of the rein-deer, who d1 gs furrows In the fnow to find It ; and as the milk and flcD1 of this animal is al~oft the o~ly fufl:enancc which can be procured during the long winters of the hi rrhcr latitudes, this mofs may be faid to fupport fome millions of mankind. b The quick vegetation that occurs on the folution of the fnows in high lati tudes _ 0: '{} · · r . ap pears very a . ~n1 1111g ; It 1eems to anfe from two caufes, t. the Jon a conti nuance of the approach111g fun above the horizon ; 2. 'the increafed irritabilit; of pl ants which have been long ex pofcd to the cold. Sec note on Anemone. All the water- fowl on the bkes of Siberia are laid by Profcffor Gmelin to re treat fouthwards on the commencement of the frofl:, except the Rai l, which !1ceps buried in the fnow. Account of Siberia. Z-z |