Sunbury American. [volume] (Sunbury, Pa.) 1848-1879, 1856-11-15

out in my bunk, when | heard the shar
twangling snap of q cord. Our six.inc
hawser had parted and we were swinging b
the two others the gale roaring like lilo
to the Southwark.
Half a minute more, and 'twang, twang
came second report. l knew it was tn
whale line by the shrilness of the ring. Gu
noble ten-inch MANILA still held on. wa
hurrying my last sock into its scal-skin boot
panion ladders Captain Kane, she won
hold much longer it's blowing the devi
himself, and ] am afraid to SURGE
"The MANILA cable was proving its. excel
lence when | reached the deck, and tie crew
as they gathered round me, were loud in it'
praises. We could hear its deep Eolear
chant, swelling through all the rattle of the
running gear and moaning Of the shrouds
1t was the death song The strands gave
way with the noise of shotted gun, and ir
the smoke that followed their recoil we were
dragged out by the wild ice at its mercy.
We steadied and did seine pretty warp
ing, and got the brig good bed in the
rushing drift. but it all come to nothing
We then tried to beat back through the
narrow ice-clogged waterway that was
driving quarter of mile wide between the
shore and the pack. 1t cost US two hours OF
hard labor, thought skillfully bestowed :; but
at the end of that time we were at least four
miles of opposite the great valley in the
centre OF Redeville Reach. Ahead of u.s.
farther to the north, we could see the straight
growing still narrower, and the heavy ice
tables grinding up and clogging it between
the shore-clifis on one side and the ledge on
the other. There was but one thing left for
u.s. to keep in some sort the command of tn e
holm hV frpp1 ,rlN
wise be driven. We allowed her to scud
under reefed foretopsail all hands watch
ing the enemy ds we closed, in silence.
T" AT in the morning we were close upon
the piling masses. We dropped our heaviest
anchor with the desperate hope of winding
the brig, but there was no withstanding the
ice torrent that followed us. We had only
tune to iasten spar as a buoy to the chain,
and left her slip. So went our best bower |!
"Down we went upon the gale again,
helplessly scraping along lee of ice seldom
less than thirty feet thick one foe, meas
ured by line as We tried to fasten it, more
than forty. ] had seen such ice only once
before, and never in such rapid motion One
upturned mass rose above our gunwale,
smashing in our bulwarks and depositing half
ton of ice in lump upon our decks. Our
staunch little brig bore herself through all
this wild adventure as if she had charmed
life.
But new enemy came in sight ahead.
Directly in our way, just beyond the line of
foe ice against which we were alternately
sliding aud humping, was group of bergs.
We had no power to avoid them and the
only question whether we were to be dashed
in pieces against them, or whether they
might not offer us some providential nook Of
refuge from the storm But, as we neared
them, we perceived that they we're at some
distance from the foe edge, and separated
from it by an interval of open water Our
hopes rose, as the gale drove us toward this
passage, and into it and We were ready to
exult when, from some unexplained cause
probably an eddy of the wind against the
lofty icewalls--we lost our headway. Almost
at the same moment We saw that the bergs
were not at rest that with a momentum Of
their own they were bearing down upon the
other ice, and that it must be our fate to be
crushed between the two.
Just then q broad sconce-pece or low
water-washed berg came driving up from the
southwark. The thought flashed upon me
of one of our escapes in Melville Bay and
as the scone moved rapidly close alongside
us, McGary managed to plant Al anchor on
its slope, and held on to it by a whale-line.
1t was an anxious moment. Our noble tow
horse, whittier than the pale horse that
seemed to be pursuing US, hauled us bravely
on, the spray dashing over his windward
tianks, and his forehead plowing up the
lesser ice as if in scorn.-rhe bergs en-
croacheG upon us as We advanced Our
channel narrowed to a width of perhaps
forty ieet we braced the yards to clear the
impending ice-walls.
- We passed clear; but it was n
close shave-so close that our port quarter
boat would have been crushed if we had not
taken it in from the davits-and found our
selves under the lea Of berg, in compari-
lively open lead. Never did heart tried men
acknowledge with more gratitude their
merciful deliverance from wretched death.
~ y
"The day had already its full share Of
| trials but there were more TO come. A flaw
drove us from our shelter, and the gale soon
carried us beyond the end of the lead, We
were again in the ice, sometimes escaping its
onset by warping, sometimes forced TO rely
on the strength and buoyancy Of the brig to
stand its pressure, sometimes scudding wildly
through the half opened drift. Our iibboom
was snapped off in the cap; we carried away
our barricade stanchions, and were forced to
! leave our little Eric, with three brave fellows
and their warps, out upon the foes behind US.
a little pool Of open water received US
at last. 1t was just beyond lofty cape that
rose up like wall, and under an iceberg that
anchored itself between MS and the gale.
And here, close under the frowning shores of
Greenland, ten miles nearer the Pole than
our holding ground of the morning, the men
! have turned in to rest.
:" was afraid to join them, for the gale
was unbroken, and the foes kept pressing
heavily upon our berg-at one time so heavily
as TO sway it on its vertical axis towards the
shore, and make its pinnacle overhang our
vessel. My poor fellows had but precarious
sleep before our little harbor was broken up.
They hardly reached the deck when we were
driven astern, our rudder splintered, and the
pintels torn from their boltings.
Now began the nippings. The first
shock took us on our port luarter; the brig
bearing il we'll, and, alter Il moment of the
old-fashioned suspense, rising by jerks hand
| somely. The next was from veteran foe,
| tongued and honeycombed, but floating in a
single table oven twenty feet in thickness.
OF course, no wood or iron could stand this
but the shoreward face OF our iceberg hap
pened to present an inclined plane, descend
ing deep into the water, and up this the brig
| was driven, as if some great steam screw
mower WAS forcing her into n dry dock