The Charleston daily news. [volume] (Charleston, S.C.) 1865-1873, 1871-06-27
THE FROZEN SEAS.
Battle of the Frost Giants-Phenomena
Of Ice Fleets.

-
a correspondent Of the New York Evening
| Post, writing from St. Johns, N. F., furnishes
an interesting account of the formation,
range, size, &C., of icebergs, from which we
make the following extracts:
INVASION OF AN IcE-ARGY.
No grandeT sight can be imagined than the
| gradual approach of q great ice.feld toward
the land, drifting before the pressure Of q
nor'easter. From the hill summit the gleam-
ing ice-line is seen ten miles of, stretching
north and south as far as the eye can reach.
| pearance is that of a vast invading army; all
clad in white uniforms, and closing In, with
| steady, determined tramp, on the devoted
| country. As the white squadrons come nearer
the advanced guard is seen, consisting OF
small floating fragments OF Ice, far ahead
Of the main body, IKE 2 cloud Of uhlans
feeling the way. before the invading host.
In stately columns they advance, grand
| and graceful as q vast flock of snow-white
swans. with a leader at the head of each.
The floating masses In the vanguard are OF
| all shapes and sizes, some as large as a
church, others no bigger than a mans head.
Here and there q huge mass, the size OF a hill
lock, towers above the rest, suggesting the
idea of q general OF division, surrounded by
his staff. and wearing q helmet with nodding
plumes above. Immediately behind these
move the serrled ranks of infantry, liz compact
file; and In fancy we can see the suns rays
cleaning from their bright bayonets, Clouds
Of cavalry guard each flank, and IN the distance
the Unreasonable host comes on in solid mass.
and now, as they near the land, scouts are de-
tacned, and little clouds of sharpshooters are
deployed. These cautiously feel their way
along the shore, searching every indentatfon,
entering every creek, groplng their way INTO
with the Invaders, who close up their ranks,
and press closer and closer. together. AS
the pressure from the army behind is felt
increasingly, the advanced guard pile
themselves one on the other, In most fantas-
tic shapes, till the whole surface OF the harbor
Is q compact mass of Ice blocks, rising at
times to a level with the decks OF the vessel;
and, with perfect safety, you can walk over
the glittering bridge. The ships are close
prisoners, chained in icy letters, from which
there Is no release till the wind changes; and
then, in reversed order, the invading host de.
parts. The vanguard becomes the r%earguard;
the pressure from behind ~relaxes; the leaders
are seen moving among the distant ranks and
arranging the march. The retreat begins, and
soon only a few stragglers are seen In the har.
Dor, staggering about in q dissipated manner,
as II they had been drinking, and their COM
rades had taken their departure before they
had slept of the fumes Of the liquor. In q
few hours, not a While speck fs visible on the
| ocean, and the green waves are dancing where
the Ice fields were lately spread.
RANGs OF THE IcEBERGs. -.
All these continents and Islands of Ice are
formed in Baf1n's Bay, chiefly on the coasts
of Greenland; and on the bosom of the great
Arctic current they are carried southwark.
Soon after passing our coasts they encounter
the warm waters Of the Gulf Stream, as, at
the Banks Of Newfoundland, it turns ofto.
wards Europe. There the higher tempera-
ture Of the atmosphere, aided by the warmth
of the water, speedily dissolVes the Ice masses,
and very seldom are any ~:ee-loes or icebergs
north latitude, although icebergs have occas-
ionally drifted to latitude AZ deg. and been en-
countered near the Azores. 1t is different
in the Southern Hemisphere, where icebergs
are met at various points of the Cape Of Good
Hope, between latitude sc deg. and SO deg.
It Is on record that in 1929 an iceberg two
miles Id circumference and!l50 feet high was
80 deg. Is min. If the Ice islands that float
past these shores travelled as far, they might
reach Cape st. Vincent, and there, being
drawn by the current that always sets In from
the Atlantic through the Straits of Gibraltar,
they would be drilled into The Mediterranean,
their cloudless skies and balmy air.
MEMORANDA OF THE BERGs.
In point of fact, these icebergs and ice is
lands are doing a great work In the economy
Of nature, and few other agencies have played
such important parts In the past annals OF
geologic history. II is calculated that up.
wards of twenty thousand square miles OF
drifting ice come down every year out OF Bal.
fms Bay into the Atlantic, moving In winter
at the rate of FIVE or six miles a day, and
reaching as far as two thousand miles from
.t..s -. Tka taaharoo nra thu nTdnrtnn nf
the Arctic glaciers, thrown of in predigious
numbers from the fringes Of these ice rivers
at their termination in the ocean. Storms and
tides assist at the birth, and then In
mountain masses they float of into
the oceaL. There size Is sometimes enormous.
Captain Sir John Ross saw several Of them IN
Bafin's Bay, aground 10 water fifteen hun'
berg is only about one-nlnth part OF the real
bulk of the whole mass, go that If one be seen,
as Is very commonly the case, one hundred
ieet high; its lowest peak. may perhaps be
away eIght hundred feet below the waves. But
some icebergs have been seen rising three
hundred feet over the sea, and these, II their
submarine portion sank to the maximum
depth, must have reached the enormous total
height of. twenty-seyen hundred teet-t1at
is rather higher than the Chevlot Hills. In
the American Journal OF Science for lS43,
10. 1861 mention Is made Of an Iceberg
aground on the Great Bank. OF New.
~foundland. The average depth of the wa
ter was five hundred feet and the visible por-
ton of the berg from fifty to seventy feet high
so that Its total height must have been little
short of six hundred feet, Of which only atenth
part remained above water. At this moment,
as | look out Of my window see three Ice.
bergs near the entrance of our harbor. The
largest is seemingly, at Its highest point, sixty
feet above the wave. 1t Is a grand sight,
about six hundred feet In length, having the
lustre of refined sugar when the SUMS rays
fall on it, and appearing Ike chalk when
the sun Is obscured. AT one extremity It
has a tower not unlike . lighthouse; The other
end slopes in terraces, down to the sea.
l observe q dark spot in lis side, which IN
dicates that it has packed IN its interior
some fragments of granite or gneiss torn from
the sides of ap arctic mountain; and this 1t IS
conveying to The banks of Newfoundland,
where, on melting, 1t will drop Its burden, to
help in building q future continent; so that,
Ike an industrious navy, 1t Is laying the tonn-
dations Of Islands yet to be-. The coast OF La
brador and the Gulf Of st. Lawrence, for a dis
lance Of seven hundred miles, is strewed over
with ice-borne boulders often six feet In diam
eter. These blocks have, in some cases., fallen
from precipitous cliffs others have been
lifted from the bottom Of the sea-, adhering
by their tops to the ice, while others have
been brought from lofty mountains far inland,
by rivers, or embedded In the glacier. In this
wpy thpep h1onEs nj qtODp are narripd across