W
E continued our progress through a labyrinth of ice, sometimes running into a berg, or grazing against its edge so close as to carry away a spar or stave a quarter-boat, but still making our way across to the Greenland shore. The sea was studded with low bergs and water-washed floes, wearing the fantastic forms which had surprised us the year before. Some were both complicated and graceful, supported generally by peduncular bases, which gave them a curious aspect of fragility. This was evidently due to the action of the waves at the water-line, aided by the warmth of the atmosphere.
If we suppose a nearly symmetrical lump of ice, floating with that stable equilibrium which belongs to its excessive submergence, the atmosphere, which has now a temperature as high as 64° in the sunshine, will gradually round off and crease the edges, and at the same time will melt the portions of the mass which are above water. Its buoyancy increasing as its weight is reduced, the berg will now rise slowly, presenting a succession of new surfaces to the abrasion of the waves; and thus we shall have the familiar mushroom or fungoid appearance which is shown in many of the plates illustrating peculiar berg forms.
The process continuing under all the modifications of wave action, while the opposing face of the berg varies with every change of its gravitating centre, we may have eccentric resemblances to animated things sculptured in the ice, and at other times forms of classic symmetry, or the frets and garniture of mediæval art.
Our sail through this fanciful archipelago was a most uncomfortable one. Our stoves had been taken down; and the scurvy, exaggerated by the increased exposure to damp, began again to bear hard upon us. We devoured eagerly the seal, of which, by good fortune, we had several re-enforcements; but as the excitements of peril declined, the energies of the men seemed to relax more and more; and I had reason to fear that we should not be able to resume our search effectively, until the health of our party had undergone a tedious renovation.
It had been determined by our commander that we should refresh at Whale Fish Islands, and then hasten back to Melville Bay, the North Water, Lancaster Sound, and Wellington Channel; and certainly there was no one on board who did not enter heart and soul into the scheme. It was in pursuance of it that we were now bending our course to the east.
The circumstances that surrounded us, the daily incidents, our destination and purpose, were the same as when approaching the Sukkertoppen a year before. There were the same majestic fleets of bergs, the same legions of birds of the same varieties, the same anxious look-out, and rapid conning, and fearless encounter of ice-fields. Every thing was unchanged, except the glowing confidence of young health at the outset of adventure. We had taken our seasoning: the experience of a winter’s drift had quieted some of our enthusiasm. But we felt, as veterans at the close of a campaign, that with recruited strength we should be better fitted for the service than ever. All, therefore, looked at the well-remembered cliffs, that hung over Kronprinsen, with the sentiment of men approaching home for the time, and its needed welcomes.