The Georgetown news., 1856-02-07
An Iceberg.

1here are at sea particular spectacles of
enhancing Interest; one, at least, of which
L must take leave to describe. | refer to
our encounter with large company of ice
bergs. Perhaps no other sight in the world
makes an impression more unique and pro-
found. Being in steamship, we could, in
the daytime without peril draw near to
them, and get good views, at greater and
less distances, OF their motion and bulk
There they lay, floating along in fellowship,
the Strangest sort of host, of all things li1-
ing or lnanlmate in the world. Like the
migratory birds, they were seeking a warm
er clIme-not, however, to refresh, but to
lose their existence. Bits of the pole, they
had broken off from their parent source,
with the cold instinct of death at their
heart they must hurry on to waste away;
and, as each day they missed something of
their icy frame, and turned uneasily with
their shifting weight to and fro in the wa
ters, they were themselves so many proph-
ecles, that whatever is frosty and forbidding
III the creation must melt in the mildness of
equatorial airs and the trOpic floods of eter-
nal friendship and love. Meantime they
themselves made pretty sharp winter
around US; though, so great was the curios-
lty to survey them, we willingly at the ear
ly dawn, breasted the boisterous and cut
ting wind, to gaze long at the solemn troop;
and one sea-sick invalid of our party was
lifted in arms from her couch to gaze thro'
a round window in the side of the ship at
'neSe new monuments of power and tokens
OF pnrlty. fall shapes and sizes, they 81
lently swarm upon their way The Lord
loves variety in all things-the crystals of
the mine, the flowers of the field, the noun
tainS of the earth, and also in what before
hand we might think only monotonous-
these cones, and domes, and spires, and pyr-
amlds-or shall they not be called chains of
icy hills?-upon the sea. SO the eye was
drawn to examine, with ever new surprise
and delight, this manifold architecture
Egyptian, Grecian and Roman by turns
in the great draft of water required for
their enormous and solid bulk, they are not
thrown about among the pillows as the
largest ships are, but seem to sailon in sub
lime and stole disregard, or with but at
least faint respect for wind and storm. One
tremendous bulk heaved its mass not far
from US, as it swept along, seemed temple
of God upon the deep. It's foundation sank
low, where beneath the superficial action of
the fercest waves, it could without rocking
upon the waters quiet as the solid granite
of the land. Its tower shot up like an as
piration to the sky. Full in front of the
rising sun, it swept onward, its steeple bla-
zing as. never upon earth blazed marble in
the light Of the day; and whatever use it
did its part to serve, in the great econo-
mics of nature, it at least answered well for
any thoughtful observer the purpose of wor-
ship in the ministry of the soul. Slowly
southwark it moved and faded by degrees
away, bearing some holy thought in its
shrine of material sanctity, and taking its
place in memory forever, though its tempo
rary and fugitive being is long since dissoI-
we'd, among bethels of prayer.