The magnificence of this scene it is impossible to describe. The gloomy silence of the surrounding country, the hoarse noise of the water dashing from an immense height, and the magnificent effect produced by the reflection of the solar rays, form a _tout ensemble_ which can only be faintly conceived. Though the mountains of Spitzbergen consist generally of rocks of primary formation, it is not altogether destitute of those of a later origin. Captain Phipps discovered several species of marble, which dissolved readily in muriatic acid. On the east side of the country, potters’ clay and gypsum have been found, and different specimens of talc, mica, and lapis olearis, are to be met with. Phipps did not perceive any metallic ores in this country, nor, as far as I know, have other voyagers discovered any. The interior of the country, however, has been very little, if at all, explored, and it would therefore be wrong to conclude against their existence from this circumstance, more especially as they are said to be found in Greenland. Solid as the rocks of this barren country are, their disintegration has gone on to a considerable extent. The combined effects of cataracts, formed of melted snow, of frosts, and tempests, are at once perceived in the quantity of grit, or coarse sand, worn down from the mountains. This sterile substance, (the only thing among the rocks resembling soil,) is somewhat fertilized by the putrified _lichens_, and dung of wild birds. No fountains, or springs of fresh water, are to be found here; frost arrests the watery fluid in its course, and prevents it from ascending to the surface. The cascades falling from the glaciers, are solely formed of melted snow, and with this only the navigators can be supplied. This inhospitable climate is not entirely destitute of vegetation; some plants are found, which brave the rigour of perpetual frost, and convey some faint representation of a more southern country. They are generally short, crabbed, and have a wretched appearance. The _Salix herbacea_, (dwarf willow,) the most vigorous of them all, scarcely rises two inches from the ground. Among the few herbs, the _Cochlearia_, (scurvy grass,) deserves the first rank, as being the providential resource of distempered seamen. Here are also found several species of _Lichen_, (liverwort,) _Saxifraga_, _Ranunculus_, _Bryum_, and a few others, of little or no use in the medical world. On the west side of Spitzbergen there are some safe harbours and roads for ships. The sea near the shore is, for the most part, shallow, and the bottom rocky; but it often suddenly deepens to some hundred fathoms, where the lead sinks in soft mud, and sometimes mixed with shells. In Smeerenberg, which has a sandy bottom, vessels may ride in thirteen fathoms water not far from the shore, where they are sheltered from all winds. The tide, from the number of islands through which it passes, flows very irregularly, in some places only three and four feet.