THE ATLANTIC INTERCOMMUNICATION BY STRAITS AND CHANNELS The Atlantic communicates with the Arctic on the north by two unequal channels, between Norway and Iceland, and Iceland and Greenland respectively. The latter is termed the East Greenland Channel, or Denmark Strait ; the fornier has no distinctive appellation. By the North Sea, the Skager Rack, the Cattegat, and Great and Little Belt, and the Sound, the Baltic is in communication with the Atlantic—either north round Scotland, or south through the Straits of Dover and the English Channel. The Irish Sea similarly opens to the ocean on the north by the North Channel, and on the south by St. George's Channel. The Bristol Channel is virtually an extension of the estuary of the Severn. The Atlantic is con nected with its most important inland sea, the Mediterranean, by the Straits of Gibraltar. The Dardanelles, Sea of Mar more, and the Channel of Constantinople connect the Medi terranean with the Black Sea, and the Suez Canal with the Red Sea. By the Mediterranean, Suez Canal, and Red Sea, vessels may now proceed directly from the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean without rounding the Cape of Good Hope.
On the western, or American side, Davis Strait opens into Baffin Bay, and thus by Smith Sound, Kennedy and Robeson Channels, into the " Pakeocrystic Sea," north of Greenland. Hudson Bay is connected with the Atlantic by a strait of the same name, Hudson Strait. The Gulf of St. Lawrence admits the Arctic current on the north by the Strait of Belle Isle. Northumberland Strait, on the south, between Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia, is connected with the open ocean by the narrow Gut of Canso, between the latter and Cape Breton. The Gulf of Mexico is connected with the Atlantic by the Strait of Florida, and with the Caribbean Sea by the Channel of Yucatan. The Caribbean Sea communicates with the open ocean by nume rous channels between the West India Islands, the principal of which are the Windward Pass, between Cuba and Haiti ; and the Mona Pass, between San Domingo and Porto Rico.
The Straits of Magellan„ and other channels between the island group of Tierra del Fuego, admits of communication with the Pacific Ocean without " rounding " Cape Horn.
The connection of the Atlantic with the other great oceans may be thus summarised :—with the Arctic by Hudson and Davis Straits, East Greenland Channel,' and the wide ex panne between Iceland and Norway; to the Antarctic it opens broadly; contiguous with the Indian Ocean for two thousand miles south of Cape Agulhas, and also communicating with this ocean indirectly by the Mediterranean, Suez Canal, and Red Sea ; with the Pacific through Magellan Strait and other Fuegean Channels, or round Cape Horn. Under very favour able circumstances vessels might reach the Pacific from the Atlantic by the North-West Passage through Baffin Bay, Barrow Strait, Melville Sound, Banks' Strait, the Arctic Ocean, and Behring's Strait, or through Ross and Simpson Strait, and thence west through Deese Strait and Coronation Gulf. The recent voyage of the " Vega" has proved the possibility of communication with the Pacific during the summer, by the North-East Passage round the northern coasts of Europe and Asia, and then through Behring's Strait. The proposed "Inter-oceanic Canal" will enable vessels to pass directly from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and thus obviate the necessity of rounding Cape Horn, or risk the dangers of a North-East or North-West passage—the former of which may be of some, but the latter can never be of any, commercial importance, both being ice-bound during the greater part of the year.