"Yes," replied Kit; "but whether they are a fluid or a force is not so clear. Tyndall and Faraday think they are a sort of force."
"It is found that this dip of the needle, or, in other words, the position of the magnetic poles, varies with the amount of heat which the earth receives from the sun," remarked Raed. "We know that heat can be changed into electricity, and, consequently, into magnetism. So, at those seasons of the year when the earth receives least sun-heat, there is least electric and magnetic force."
"That only confirms me in my belief that the luminiferous ether through which light and heat come from the sun is really the electric and magnetic element itself," remarked Kit; "that strange fluid which runs through the earth as water does through a sponge, making currents, the direction of which are indicated by these magnetic poles. The same silent fluid which makes this needle point down to the deck makes the telegraphic instrument click, makes the northern lights, and makes the lightning."
"I agree with you exactly," said Raed.
It's no use talking with these two fellows: they've made a regular hobby of this thing, and ride it every chance they get.
Prince Henry's Foreland, on the south side of the straits, was in sight at noon, distant, we presumed,—from our estimate of the width of the passage at this place,—about eleven leagues. It is a high, bold promontory of the south main of Labrador. At this distance it rises prominently from the sea. The glass shows it to be bare, and destitute of vegetation. By two o'clock, P.M., we had passed the scattered islets, and bore up toward the north main again to avoid the floating ice. At five we were running close under a single high island of perhaps an acre in extent, and rising full a hundred feet above the sea, when old Trull, who was in the bows, called sharply to the man at the wheel to put the helm a-starboard.
"What's that for?" shouted the captain, who was standing near the binnacle.
"Come and take a look at this, sur," replied the old man.
Kit and I were just coming up the companion-stairs, and ran forward with the captain. A long, leather-colored fish, as we thought at first, was floating just under the starboard bow.
"Thought it was a low ledge," said the old man. "I see 'twan't a moment after. I take that to be a sea-sarpent, sur."