The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1898-09-24

thing except what belonged to us. The
sounds and strange indispensable nights
were appalling. God, how grusome it was!
II a gale had not sprung up and let us loose
some Of our men would have gone crazy in
a day or two more. For eight days we
battled with gigantic hergs, pack ice,
foes and patches and there was not an
On the ninth day the wind fell to a gentle
breeze, the sea went down, aud at noon we
were within a mile of the biggest berg
Of them all. 1t was three bergs frozen to-
gether, or looked that way, and from the
water to the highest point must have been
distance of 500 feet. 1t was a solid mass
ravines and plateaus, as you find on a
mountain. AS we sailed slowly along a
new sight presented itself every moment,
and the grandeur and solidity of the great
pers to each other.
We had traversed two thirds of the
length of the big berg when it began to
turn on its axis, as it we're. | suppose
some current far down was at work at the
gigantic base 1t revolved from east TO
west, turning slowly and majestcally, and
as we watched it with bated breath the
captain suddenly raised his glass to his eye
and sung out:
Good God. Mr.. Clarke, bus look there
on that shelf about fifty feet up"
took the glass and at Once made out
human fgures-men seated with their faces
toward us. A moment later we had run
up flag, brought the bark to the wind aud
were firing musketS. was making the
boat ready when the pale:aced captain ad-
vanced and whispered:
"rhey are dead men, Mr.. Clarke, hut
get the bodies il you can They must be
the men from the Meteor"
Four sailors pulled me as near the berg
as dared 60 and with the glass to my
eyes | brought the bodies within three feet
of me. There were three seamen and the
passenger Wellby. They sat with folded
arms and their open eyes on the sea, and
the cold had preserved them until it was
hard to believe them dead. Pulling along
few hundred feet found landing place
and accom- panied by one Of the men, clam
bered over the ice toward the bodies. We
reached spot directly beneath them, hut
there was perpendicular cliff nearly a
hundred feet high between us and the
shelf. There had been no cliff when they
first set foot on the shelf. They reached
the spot when the ship struck and bounded
back to 20 down, and there they had per-
ished from hunger and exposure For
three years or more they had drifted about
their arms always folded, sheir CLASSY eyes
staring out to sea. The berg on which they
were originally cast had cGumbled to a third
OF its bulk and then been driven amidst
Others and enlarged again. The swell pre-
vented our landing on that side, and on
oil other sides the berg rose straight up. l
returned to the bark and reported, and it
was determined to stand by until land
ing could be made, but by night another
gale came on and ran US a hundred miles
to the east and though we spent ten days
looking for the lost berg, we could not find
it, 1t had either broken up or gone driv-
ing back into that region of eternal ice and
silence and death. AS the grieving woman
dreamed so had things come about, but it
was not for the hand of man to rescue the
poor fellows from their icy raft Seated
with elbow to elbow, with eyes searching
the cold and driving sea and never hope
in their hearts, they had died and the wild
gales had chanted their requiem.