Dodgeville chronicle. [volume] (Dodgeville, Wis.) 1862-current, 1867-09-27


and it seemed as If the old Roman ruin
had suddenly taken fire. In the shadows
of the bergs, the water was rich green,
and nothing could be more soft and tender
than the gradations of color made by the
sea, shoaling on the sloping tongue of a
berg close beside us. The tint increased
in intensity where the ice overhung the
water, and deep cavern, near by, exhibit
ed the solid color of the malachite, mingled
with the transparency of the emerald /;
while, IN strange contrast, broad streak
of cobalt blue ran diagonally through its
BODY" These beautiful miracles of nature
are sometimes of an incredible size. In
Tessnissak Bay there was one which had
been grounded, the natives said, for two
years, and which, being almost square-sided
above the sea, must have borne the same
shape beneath it, SO that its contents could
be Appropriated to; the wall which faced
the shore was more than three hundred
feet high, and quarter of a mile long, SO
that DR.. Hayes estimatedit to weigh some
thing like two thousand millions of tons.
1t had stranded in depth Of half mile.
Once only, the well-steered vessel fell
foul Of one of these floating monsters.
aThe schooner struck on the starboard
quarter, and the shock, slight though it
was, disengaged some fragments of ice that
were large enough to have crushed the yes
sci, had they struck her, and also many lit
tie Jumps which ratified about us-but, for
tunately, no person was hit. The quarter
deck was quickly cleared, and all hands,
crowding forward, anxiously watched the
boat. The berg now began to revolve, and
was settling slowly over US; the little
Jumps fell thicker and faster upon the after
deck, and the forecastle was the only place
where there was the least chance OF safety.
At length, the berg itself saved us from de-
structiOn an immense mass broke OFT from
that part which was beneath the surface
of the sea, and this, dozen times larger
than the schooner, came rushing up with
In few yards of us, sending a vast volume
of foam and water flying from its sides.
This rupture arrested the revolution, and
the berg began to settle in the opposite di-
rection. And how came another danger.
A long tongue was protruding immediate
ly underneath the schooner; already, the
keel was slipping and grinding upon it,
and it seemed probable that we should be
knocked up into the air like football, or
at least capsized" But once more the berg
itself came to their relief, for its opposite
side began to split, piece by piece, and sent
the huge mass revolving back again. The
reports followed in such quick succession
that 80 the whole air seemed a reservoir of
frighttul sound" but the hard words
broke no bones, and the little schooner es-
capped from its terrible foe" still rocking
and rolling like thing of life" and emit
ing great cascades from its split sides into
the foaming sea-with life, though without
a mainboom For five hours this Titan
tumbling and crashing continued, and then
from the mass /" a piece about a mile long,
and a hundred feet high, came of, with
report which could not have been exceed
ed by a thousand pieces Of artillery stimuli
taneously discharged" which concluded
the display Gas it well might, except that
that the two fragments kept wallowing in
the sea for hours afterwards. CTct~ pq
I These iceberg troubles assailed our voy
ayers in Baf1n's Bay; but when they
reached Smiths Sound, and endeavored
to make their way so far as Cape Hather-
ton, intending there to winter, came the
worse dangers of the pack-ice. Owing to
the great audacity of its captain, the little
schooner was actually beset in mid-chan-
nel The ice came go rapidly down the
Sound that 1t nipped and held the ship.
The dreadful change from comparatively
open water to "pack" was marvellously
sudden The scene around us was as i'm
posing as it was marvellous. Except the
earthquake and volcano, there is not in
nature an exhibition OF force comparable
with that of the ice-6elds of the Arctic seas.
They close together, when driven by the
wind or by currents against the land or
other resisting object, with the pressure of
millions of moving tons, and the crash,
aud noise, and confusion are truly terrific.
We were now in the midst of one of the
most thrilling Of these exhibitions of polar
dynamics, and we became uncomfOrtably
conscious that the schooner was to become
a sort of dynamometer Vast ridges were
thrown up wherever the foes came to-
gether, to be submerged again when the
pressure was exerted in Another quarter;
and over the sea around us these pulsating
lines of uplift, which in some cases reached
an altitude of sixty feet-higher than our
mast head-told of the strength and power
of the enemy which was threatening u.s..
At length the ice actually touched the
schooner, and as if with the elevating
power of thousand jack-screws, we found
ourselves going up into the air. Thus in
voluntary exalted, they remained for a
very anxious eight hours; but fortunately,
the monster foes changed their course to
the westward, and causing the one upon
which the schooner hung to revolye, set
the United States free, though sorely dam
aged !; the hold filled with water, the rud-
der split, the sternpost started, and the
whole ship rendered notsonly longer no ice
proof but unseaworthy.
With extreme difficulty, they got into a
bay, they christened Port Foulke {atter the
chief promoter of the expedition) and
there determined to winter Everybody
is acquainted with the manner of taking
things snug in an Arctic harbor the roof
ing in of the deck; the clearing out of the
hold (as being the warmest place for the
men to livein); and the conveying sof the
cargo on shore. The popularity of the
present case was the extraordinary number
of livestock in the shape of some Els
quimaux dogs; there were no less than
thirty of these magnificent wild beasts on
board purchased at a great price-on &C.
count of canine disease then prevalent,
which made them Scarce-at various ma
tive stations along the coast), and it may
be imagined how pleasant itswas to house
them in the SNOWFALL built round the ship,
and get their room instead of their compa-
ny. The expedition thus possessed no less
than three firstrate teams" DR.. Hayes
himself had what he justly entities "a re-
spectacle turn. out" twelve dogs and a
fine sledge. The animals are in most ex-
cellent condition, every one of them strong
and healthy and they are very fleet.
They whirl my Greenland sledge over the
ice with celebrity not calculated for weak
nerves. have actually ridden behind
them over sixteen measured miles in TWEEN
weight minutes: and without stopping to
hloM the team have returned in thirty