The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1884-10-26
FILE eLAcIERs OF ALAsKA.
Natural Scenery Which Far Surpasses that
of Switzerland.

of Switzerland.
Correspondence San Francisco Chronicle.
There are natural features which cannot be
described, and Glacier bay is one of these To
picture 1t so that those VINO have never seen it
can realize Its true appearance one needs more
than PEN and ink, and paper he needs the
painters canvas and his brush, and even then
man must be artist of unusual ability to
faithfully reproduce the colorings that are pres
emit or TO depict correctly the different attrac
tons of the favored place, with its glaciers, its
lcebergs and its mountains of dazzling white
ness At our left and on our right ran two high
ridges OF frost-covered hills, backed here and
there by whltened peaks reaching far above the
greenness. Around us lay the unruffled waters
OF the bay stretching away toward the south,
past a group of tree grown islands, to where
a line OF blush SUBMITS rose into
view. No signs of civilization relieved the
wildness of the neighboring shores. A wilder
ness lay all about us, with waters bathing the
rect OF mountains and snowbanks resting on
rocky heights, while far off in the distance, and
so Tar removed that only their general outlines
were visible, and every ugly scar was hidden,
doomed the triple SUBMITS of the Farweather
range, shooting pure and white 900 feet above
the nils gathered about their base. Other
ranges have greater altitude than this of Fair
weather, but few rise from so near the sea, or
have so little to rob them of their height Look
ing at this Alaskan group, the mountains seem
to have been shot up from the ground and they
stapd like cakes of ice frosted with freshly fallen
SilOWs IH6y were one DunQPeQ miles away Wlen
we first caught sight of them, and the air was
crisp and clear and the range itself is tall and
massive.
There are some 600 glaciers altogether in
Alaska, varying in size, but in nearly every in
stance having dimensions far greater than any
in Switzerland. Those extending down from
the Falrweather group and from the lesser
heights guarding the bay on the north and south
number six in all and the largest bears the name
OF Muir, in honor of the California geologist,
John Muir, who was the first white man whom
the Indians guided to the frozen river. 1t is five
miles or more in length, and at it's contact with
the bay is three miles wide and has a solid
height above the water of 200 feet with pin
nacles of spirelik design rising 80 and 400 feet
above the more solid mass Underneath the i'm
mense cakes of ice and snow constituting the
glacier and which are piled together in the wild
est disorder, runs. a living stream of water
coursing through its darkened passage with the
rumble of thousand carts. Escaping from the
ice at last. it boils upward from beneath the
glacier front, then min giles with the waters of
the bay and flows off toward the outer sea. The
constant wear of this sunless river acting with
other causes, forces particles of the glacier to
break away from the main body, and as they
fall a roar, as though hundred cannon were
discharged, wakes the echoes Of the place, and
columns of water leap upward against the frozen
cliff until is drenehed with spray.
During the summer months, whaTt 6here is
more general warmth, the glacier is eaten away
for distance of half mile more but later
III Une oeosohi WHeH eue sun peSluS 10 lOSe us
power and the days begin to shorten, the ever
moving mass regains the distance lost and ap
pears in the spring again as long and high as
ever. Through the warmer months the bay is
filed with fragments that have fallen, and
which later go floating away like icebergs from
the Polar sea. Many of these huge cakes
measure hundred feet in height and resemble
islands of eolored ice and snow. Some are fiat
and square in shape. others are high and angu-
lar, while others still are covered with towers
and pinnacleS and contain deeD caves within
which turks that cold green coloring so charac-
teristic Of icy masses. Sailing among these
bergs, and with Fairweather on the one side and
the glacier on the other, and feeling the chill
imagine himself among the ever-frozen barriers
OF the far north, where, as here, there is no
greenness, but only a field of white-deserted,
cold and silent.