The universal geography : earth and its inhabitants

TIIK WHITE SEA. 349which it is distinguished by the parallelism of its bays and estuaries, a salientfeature of North Russian geography.The White Sea, with an area of from 47,000 to 48,000 square miles, must inrnany respects be considered as a lake, or rather a group of lakes, communicatingwith the Frozen Ocean. The narrow entrance rounding the Lapland coast,while changing it to a saline gulf, has preserved its independent character in theaspect and outlines of its shores and the relief of its bed. Thus the "White Seais deeper than the ocean with which it is now connected, falling from about 170feet at its entrance to over 1,000 feet towards the extremity of the KandalakshaFig. 184. WbScale 1 : 5,200,000.E. of?.EafG55 to 110Fathoms.___ 50 Miles.Gulf. The Gulf of Onega, which, like its namesake of the Neva basin, mightalmost be called Lake Onega, is somewhat shallow, being no more than 260 feetdeep, and is separated by the Solovetzkiy Isles from the main basin. When theWhite Sea was a lake, like Ladoga and Onega, it was probably at a higher levelthan at present, and drained to the Polar Sea through a river forming a continuationof the Upper Dvina. But oscillations of level may have caused the sea toburst into the lacustrine basin, converting its fluvial outflow into a strait. Theelevation of the entrance prevents the sand and mud from being carried seawards,and the basin is being slowly filled by the continuous deposits of the rivers, so