Entering this bay from the Puerto de Valdés, one is instantly conscious of the presence of something wonderful and mysterious. Long before it can be seen, this presence is felt, like that of a living thing. Quick, vibrant, thrilling, and inexpressibly sweet, its breath sweeps out to salute the voyager and lure him on; and with every sense alert, he follows, but with no conception of what he is to behold.
One may have seen glaciers upon glaciers, yet not be prepared for the splendor and the magnificence of the one that palisades the northern end of this bay.
The Fremantle Glacier was first seen by Lieutenant Whidbey, to whose cold and unappreciative eyes so many of the most precious things of Alaska were first revealed. He simply described it as "a solid body of compact, elevated ice ... bounded at no great distance by a continuation of the high ridge of snowy mountains."
He heard "thunder-like" noises, and found that they had been produced by the breaking off and headlong plunging into the sea of great bodies of ice.
In such wise was one of the most marvellous things of the world first seen and described.
The glacier has a frontage of about four miles, and its glittering palisades tower upward to a height of from three to four hundred feet. There is a small island, named Heather, in the bay. Poor Whidbey felt the earth shake at a distance of three miles from the falling ice.
In ordinary light, the front of the glacier is beautifully blue. It is a blue that is never seen in anything save a glacier or a floating iceberg—a pale, pale blue that seems to flash out fire with every movement. At sunset, its beauty holds one spellbound. It sweeps down magnificently from the snow peaks which form its fit setting and pushes out into the sea in a solid wall of spired and pinnacled opal which, ever and anon breaking off, flings over it clouds of color which dazzle the eyes. At times there is a display of prismatic colors. Across the front grow, fade and grow again, the most beautiful rainbow shadings. They come and go swiftly and noiselessly, affecting one somewhat like Northern Lights—so still, so brilliant, so mysterious.
There was silence upon our ship as it throbbed in, slowly and cautiously, among the floating icebergs—some of which were of palest green, others of that pale blue I have mentioned, and still others of an enchanting rose color. Even the woman who had, during the whole voyage, taken the finest edge off our enjoyment of every mountain by drawling out, "Oh—how—pretty! George, will you just come here and look at this pretty mountain? It looks good enough to eat"—even this woman was speechless now, for which blessing we gave thanks to God, of which we were not even conscious at the time.
It was still fired as brilliantly upon our departure as upon our entrance into its presence. The June sunset in Alaska draws itself out to midnight; and ever since, I have been tormented with the longing to lie before that glacier one whole June night; to hear its falling columns thunder off the hours, and to watch the changing colors play upon its brilliant front.
Even in the middle of the day a peculiarly soft and rich rose color flashes from it and over it. One who has seen the first snow sifting upon a late rose of the garden may guess what a delicate, enchanting rose color it is.