New-York tribune., 1899-07-30
ANTARCTIC ICEBEEGS.
DIFFERENT FROM THOSE IN ARCTIC
WATERS.
Ar,r ANTARCTIC CONTINENT SURROUNDED BY A
VERY WIDE PACK-PERiioUS ENPERl-
ENCE OF EXPLORERS.

t,o,Itur, rarely reaches above freezing
point where the attenuaied nature OF the south-
ern continent allows free play TO the polar cur
rents and where the sun fails To bring out
anything that might be called spring OF sum
ncr flower, IL follows that the ice conultlohS
are vastly different from those OF the Northei'
Hemisphere where at a corresponding Iati'uue
summer clothes the land with HOWerS anu ntiS
the air with nnumorabe bees lheSe "'ut'E
different conditions are easily seen 10y passing
comparison of the northern berg win the
southern. the former speedily becomes pima
cled and grotesque as it journeys Soulh' VII
the latter retains its original tabuiaI Ipr.l III
very low attitudes II is only when the southern
lprr reaches "A distance north where the sun AT
last begins 10 make his heat felt that IL thdWS
and presents the great needle points ana sut-
tcTing AIDES observed 50 IIequcHt! "'"'
the Arctic Circle.
summer of the Antarctic and that Of the Arctic
is due to the fac; that while the latter region
is a polar BASIN surrounded by vast tracts ol
land which retain the summer heat, the former
is a comparatively small tract of land IN ire
mcndOus cXpdnSe OF water. "nlch pdItS VIII"
its heat very quickly.
The home and origin Of the southern berg are
matter full of romantic interest In I''i
Captain Cook sailed down into the unknown
Antarctic regions and after terrible hardsnipS
reached a spot where he saw a snoW-Whlle
brightness in the clouds TO the south, ana ~
knew he was near the ice fields. Four hours
later he was stopped by great ice barrier IN
latitude II degrees south. whore the mounta!i'S
of ice. rising one above the other. tier upon tler'
polar sky. The desoate grandeur OF that icy
coast appalled, the great navigator and. seeing
no possibility of pushing To the pole over those
impossible mountains. he ccntented himseli
with having gone further than any one had
ever been before and. ne thought. as far as any
man could go. lie speaks of vast glaciers de-
scending from the interior. and Of ice Islands
and floats near the coast: and from his remarks
II is easily seen that he had found the home OF
the southern berSs.
The glaciers coming slowly down from the
f1fa Ian hot tbp "A IN
sides Of this ce-bound continental coast, pro
duccd the tabular icebergs by swapping off from
time To time at their extremtieS. and tn se.
once set free. sailed northward In due time on
the ocean currents This barrier discovered by
Cook evidently outstanding cOastline Of
the Antarctic continent, for. more than ha'f
century ater. Sir James Ross in the Erebus and
the Terror found a similar barrier. probably
continuous with that Of Cook. at far higher
latitude of 7S degrees south. Here at the feet
Of the great volcanoes ETcbuS and Terror, so
named after his ships. Ross fOurd a further
home of the berg.
This coast Of Victoria Land was grand scene
of glaciers launching their gigantic ends ir'N
the sea From the cOastne. where the walls Of
fee stood sheer cliffs hundreds Of feet high.
the mountains inland ranged one over the other.
eliminating in the volcanic peaks 1000 feet
high. And down the grooves of these noun
tains cam~ the slow moving glaciers To people
the Southern with the floating dangers
which render exploration there thing Of in
tense risk to the bOldest and most skilful navi-
gator Ross says this ice barrier is perhaps
Lon "A
wonderful object"
AS the ice barrier the bergs. When they
are set free they are solid fragments Of the par
ent glacier with tops like billiard tables and
sides like cliffs. often measuring much as 2OD
feet ir height and several miles in extent. They
maintain their tabular character generally. and
their vast size until they either collide and break
up suffer a thaw in low latitudes. In the
former alternative they supply the material for
the floating cepacks and in the latter they
assume strange shapes. turreted, pinnacled and
undermined. as like glistenng fairy palaces, they
slowly dissolve beneath the sunlight Cook men
tions several interesting bergs with which he
made acquaintance. One was 80 feet high and
half 4 mile in circumference. He says: 1T was
fiat at the top, and its sides rose in a perpen-
dicular direction. against which the broke
exceedingly high" This berg must have been
from a barrier not very far south for the fur
ther such a barrier is from the Pole the thinner
the ice becomes
In regard to this point it may be mentioned
that in 1893 Larsen found in Grahams Land a
barrier which. being in compare lively low lati-
tude was only from 20 feet to 90 feet high.
while that discovered by Ross in latitude 1S'
S. was very much higher D'Urville the gallant
French explorer. met with bergs in latitude %
S. IT would appear from this that their place of
origin was an ice barrier even further south
than that found by Sir James Ross The Dun
dee whalers in 1929 also saw bergs over 200
feet high: these too in all probability came from
a barrier which DR.. Murray is of opinion faces
an open sea for some distance south of Rosss
Ultima Thule. And. If there be an ice coast still
further south, IL ~ vaguely hnted at Dy MT
Bulls measurements in 1896 Of a berg GOD feet
high which at first he mistook for an island.
A thaw among Antarctic bergs is rot often met
with in the height of summer; but to show
that such thing does occur occasionally the
experience of Ross may be mentioned On one
occasion when he considerably within the
Antarctic Circle the thermometer stood at IL
degrees but in the bergs all around there were
evidences that they had suffered partial thaw
some time previously. for great cicles hung
from their sides. On another occasion outside
the Circle he saw a complete thaw attended by
sounds like the discharge of heavy artillery as
the huge masses split and fell arart But. al