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Ice (Water in solid form It)

water in solid form. It is speber, 1831, took Acre by storm , and quickly made himself master of the cifically lighter than water which is just whole of Syria. A peace was concluded about to freeze, and therefore floats in on May 4, 1833, the Turks not only con- it. The formation of ice takes place senting to give up Syria, but also making generally at the surface of water. This over Adana to Ibrahim personally, on a is owing to the peculiarity that, when kind of lease. When war broke out water has (at the ordinary atmospheric again between Mehemet Ali and the Sul- pressure) cooled down to within 3.9° C. tan in 1839, Ibrahim was again success- of freezing, it ceases to contract as it ful, totally routing the Turks in the did before with increase of cold, and begreat battle of Nisib. The interference gins to expand till it freezes (see HEAT). of the great Powers eventually compelled In some instances, not very well exhim to relinquish all his Syrian con- plained, ice forms at the bottom of quests and return to Egypt. In 1848 rivers and is called ground-ice or anchor- ice. 1848 rivers and is called ground-ice or anchorhe was installed by the Porte as viceroy ice.

ICE Water in ordinary cases freezes at the degree of temperature marked 0° on the Centigrade and Réaumur's thermometers and 32° on Fahrenheit's, but if it is kept perfectly still it may be cooled to nearly 5.5° C. below freezing (22° F.) and still remain liquid. Sea-water, and salt water in general, freezes at a lower temperature than pure water; in doing this, part of the salt separates, and the ice when melted, gives water that is fresher than that on which the ice was formed.

In the neighborhood of the poles, and on mountains of a certain height in all latitudes, there exist immense masses of permanent ice; and even in some districts of Siberia, where a kind of culture is practicable in summer, there are found, at a certain depth below the surface of the earth, strata of ice, mingled with sand.

Nansen and Peary discovered that the entire surface of Greenland, except the mountainous coasts, is covered with the largest ice-cap known to exist, having a supposed depth of several thousand feet.

The W. coast of Greenland produces most of the icebergs that float in the North Atlantic. From the polar icefields and glaciers which are always protruding themselves into the sea, great floating masses become detached and form icebergs, floes, and drift ice (see GLACIER). From the specific gravity it is calculated that the volume of an iceberg below the water is about nine times that of the protruding part.

The trade in ice is now one of great and increasing importance. Ice has come to be more and more largely used in preserving provisions, both in refrigerating chambers and otherwise. In surgical operations it is used to produce partial anæsthesia; it serves in fevers to cool the mouth and reduce the internal temperature, while ice in bags, applied to the spine, is found helpful in many cases of sea-sickness and in other applications. In 1799 the first cargo of ice was sent from New York to Charleston, and ice was imported into England from Norway on a considerable scale as early as 1823. The export of ice from the United States was begun about 1805 by a merchant named Tudor, who sent ice from Boston to the West Indies. After persevering against many losses he succeeded in 1833 in establishing a trade with Calcutta, Madras, and Bombay; and now not only is it sent in vast quantities to these places, but also Hong Kong and Batavia. Triest sends ice to Egypt, Corfu, and Zante; Switzerland sends it to France, and Germany sometimes gets her supply from the Bavarian lakes.

In the United States the ice harvest is gathered in on an enormous scale and