The Camden journal. [volume] (Camden, S.C.) 1866-1891, 1891-01-08
ICEBERG CAPERS.
THE TRICKS AND ANTICS OF
ARCTIC MONSTERS.
1t is Grand Spectacle TO See Noun
tain Of Ice Turn q Double
Sc.lersault-"Icebers
Calves"


No one who has ever seen grand,
stately iceberg on sits solemn southwark
march, writes Frederick Schwatka, in
the New York Herald, would ever credit
these floating islands of ice with undig-
nifed capers and erratic movements, so
impressive is the air of awful stiffness and
almost solemn solidity that surrounds
these colossal children of cold climates.
Still great mountain of ice will some
times vary itssmonotonous movements of
steady drifting by turning somersaults
and double. somersaults and whirling
tricks until it looks like some huge hy-
perborean hippopotamus with skin of
snowlike whiteness, wallowing around
in the waters of the northern sea.
have seen but one such overturning
of these moving mountains of marble,
and surely it looked-as if the t'great
waters of the deep were breaking up"
and that the end ofall, things had come.
Great green waves went laundering by
as if q hurricane might have been howl 4
ing y hours across the sea that but a.
few moments before had been as motion
less as mill pond. Flying fecks of
foam dash down from dizzy heights
above, aud its slippery sides are almost
acoSercdwith cascades: formed fron the
waters that have been. lifted up by the
rapidly overturning berg.
: The first intimation we had of the
comm. ON OF the conYulsion was dull
shock from under the. water against our
ships side as:ff q submarine blast had
been exploded, shock very much like
that given when the great He'll Gate
niine.in New York haihor was sprung,
sahd rloment aftcrwarf hugh rising
.sof the sea ncar one side of the iceberg
was apparent, and through this vast lake
Of uplifted waters broke through snow
white mass of ice that:hkd been detached
from the hugh crystal mountain far
down in the oceans depths, and that
gcame whirling to the surface with q
swiftncss that seemed lift it half way
out of the sea, and which kept it spin
ming and splashing for q sfull five minutes
aftefward.
The release of this Sportion from its
frozen fetters far below had disturbed
the ''stable equilibrium1-as the learned
scientists would say-of the greater and
parent berg, and moment afterward it
began its stupendons swasing, as if some
earthquake were infipspiing it from rbeS.
meath. until in one of its collosal careen-
ings it fell over and seemed to bury it.
self in Il mass of milk like foam, as if
thousand demons were drowning in the
lashed waters of the green sea, and that
sent tremendous tidal waves tearing
across the dephs that would have en-
quilted the Great Eastern had she been
near. 1t sank for second only and
then rapidly reappeared with creamy
crest that in shallow sheets of white
poured down the perpendicular sides
of the mighty glacial giant that was
trying so hard to'tind a quiet rest in his
watery bed.
Woe to the ship that has ventured too
near one of these monsters of ice just as
it has taken notion to give display of
its Arctic antics, for if it be broadside to
to the tremendous tidal wave that comes
curling outward from the center of COM
motion. and has not time to turn lend
on" to meet the rapid rush of waters, it
NAV bc thrown upon its ''beam ends" as
the sailor would say, or thrown over on
side, by the steep front of the wave, then
fill with water and sink. Such Arctic
accidents have been known to occur to
careless cruisers in the iceberg region,
and probably some Of the very mysterious
disappearance of polar parties would be
solved in this way if the riddle were
really unravelled.
TIN again if the boat has only sailing
power she is liable to meet the most er-
ratio gusts of wind and sudden squalls
that can upset her rs suddenly as tidal
wave. Everybody has noticed how much
more powerful and erratic are the winds
around the base of very high buildir,,
in city than elsewhere in it. And so
with the great iceberg. 1t catches all
the wandering winds of the high heavens
and directs them downward, winding and
twisting around its base, until it is very
unsafe for sailing boat to venture near
thess .cddying gusts. So between the
little iccbergs popping up from the water
below aud falling down from the sides
above, coupled with Il chance of the
colossus of them all turning hyperbo-
rean handspring that fairly sets the old
ocean frantic with excitement, aud not
forgetting the twisting tornadoes that
the berg brings down to its base. makes
it altogether an uncertain undertaking to
have q polar picnic too near one of these
crystal mountains.
The Arctic whalers. who are the best
navigators of these ice laden waters, call
these little bergs thas break off of the
bic ones either above or below the water
line Iceberg calves" and they have no
friendship for them, although they will
occasionally deign to pull up alongside
of small "calf'' and cut enough ice of
of it (Which suppose they ought to call
"veal') to fill up their rcfrigerators or
ice chests and have ice and ice water
aboard until it slowly melts and disap-
pears.
Each one of these little (O icebergs
again sheds still smaller ones as it slowly
crumb!cs to pieces on its march toward
the equator, and the huge iceberg itself,
with which we first began onr descrip-
ton, vas only "calf'' that had once
broken off from the seaward face Of the
grand glacier or huge, moving river of
ice. So they keep dividing and subdi-