Then one man told what the ice did to a sailing-vessel he was taking down the river late one season. He hoped never to take another down so late. He had got out of his course one night in the dangerous ways off Crane Island, and finally dropped anchor to hold her against the crush of ice. But the anchor chain snapped like shoe-string under the ice pressure, and they were borne along on a glacier-field until they struck on a reef—just what he had feared. Now, the ice could neither break the reef nor drive them over it, but it ground its way right through the schooner's stern, ripping her wide open, so that the river poured in, and down they went until the yard-arms touched the hummocks, with pilot and crew left to scramble over the floe as best they could in the darkness, and wait for daylight on the frozen rocks.
At this the others, taking up the cue of thrilling happenings, told stories of dangers on the river one after another until the tardy pilot, who had jingled up meanwhile unnoticed, was in his turn forced to wait for them.
"I was just putting off one night," began a tall man, who spoke better English than the rest, "just putting off from this very place—"
"Thash nothing," interrupted the later comer, "I shaw sh-sword fish clashe a wh-whale once off Saguenay River, an wh-whale—an sh-sword fish—" then he mumbled to himself and dozed by the stove.
The tall man went on with his tale, which described how, on the night in question, he was about to board a down-coming steamer of the Leyland line (he was to take the place of the Montreal pilot), when she crashed into a tramp steamer coming up in a head-on collision, and two sailors sleeping in their bunks were instantly killed. He described the panic that ensued, and told what they did, and wound up with a queer theory (which he declared perfectly sound, and the others agreed with him) that the growth of cities along the river is every year increasing the danger of such night collisions through the dazzle of lights.
Presently we started for the boats. A burly line, with caps reaching down, and collars reaching up, until everything was covered—ears, forehead, chin, everything but a peeping place for nose and eyes. I can still hear the squeak and crunch of snow under foot, and see the glare of it. We passed a snow-field, where the river-buoys are left through winter, spar-buoys, gas-buoys, and bell-buoys ranged along now like great red tops numbed by the cold to sleep.
RIVER-BUOYS ON THE BANK FOR THE WINTER.
Then they put off in the boats—three open boats—that are sleds as well, with runners on the flat bottoms and ends turned up in an easy slant, so that when the broken ice gets too thick for paddling they may be hauled up to slide over it. This queer method of transit is practised on the St. Lawrence, by those who dare, during certain weeks of winter when the river is no longer open nor yet frozen into a solid ice-bridge, but partly open and partly solid. So it was now.
The first rule of the boats is that every man lay hand to paddle and work. There are no passengers here but the sick, and they are rarely taken. Not that the pilots would mind paddling other men across, but the other men would almost certainly freeze if they sat still. There is no safety against the blasts that sweep this river, when the glass says twenty below, but in vigorous, ceaseless exertion.