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-- Richard Langley

On Sat, 19 Mar 2005, George Huxtable wrote:

>This story has little to do with navigation, but as a way to impress your
>crew, well, I've never seen a better one.
>
>William Scoresby the Younger was a whaling master of strongly scientific
>bent, who was eventually elected to the Royal Society. He made voyages each
>year to the "Greenland Whaling", the icy waters West of Spitzbergen.
>
>On 23rd May 1815, in the ice, he records this in his journal-
>
>"Amused the sailors by igniting their pipes with a lens made of transparent
>ice, which to their amazement performed the concentration without any loss
>to its own substance."
>
>I've never heard of such a party-trick before. Has anyone else? Scoresby
>must have known how to make such an ice-lens with reasonable accuracy.
>
>Unfortunately, his journal entry ends with the all-too-common note-
>
>"Several ships near - all at a loss to know where to look for fish."
>
>George.
>
>================================================================
>contact George Huxtable by email at george@huxtable.u-net.com, by phone at
>01865 820222 (from outside UK, +44 1865 820222), or by mail at 1 Sandy
>Lane, Southmoor, Abingdon, Oxon OX13 5HX, UK.
>================================================================
>


===============================================================================
 Richard B. Langley                            E-mail: lang@unb.ca
 Geodetic Research Laboratory                  Web: http://www.unb.ca/GGE/
 Dept. of Geodesy and Geomatics Engineering    Phone:    +1 506 453-5142
 University of New Brunswick                   Fax:      +1 506 453-4943
 Fredericton, N.B., Canada  E3B 5A3
     Fredericton?  Where's that?  See: http://www.city.fredericton.nb.ca/
===============================================================================

   

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