We approached the glacier to the left, and when so near that we had barely more than room to wheel about we changed our course, and slowly steamed over to the opposite side, a distance, as I have before observed, of nearly two miles.
I have spoken of the glacier front as a wall, a cliff, and a coast-line. As a coast-line it is winding; as a wall or cliff it is perfectly vertical; but it is far from smooth. On the contrary, it presents the most fantastic collection of forms that can be conceived of—caves that are apparently limitless, peaks like church spires in symmetry, Gothic arches, clefts that wind away until they are lost in deep blue. And in this blue we see the most perfect of all transparent hues, changing too with every moment, and subtle as the colors of the opal. Talk of painting it! the “light of a dark eye in woman” would not be more difficult. The green of the caves is not less subtle, nor less beautiful. This green is observed wherever the ice overhangs the water. In the sunlight the surface is pure white, except where there has occurred a recent fracture; and the effect is that of the most delicate satin, in all its changes of surface, produced by the different angles in which the light is reflected to the eye.
We enjoyed a most excellent opportunity of observing all these phenomena while passing over, as we went only at half speed, and spent almost an hour in reaching the opposite side. Near the centre, and not far from the front of the glacier, we found the deepest water, the color of which changed, soon after passing the centre, from a light green to a dirty brown. The cause of this was soon explained. The eastern side of the valley, in which the glacier rests, is much deeper than the other side, and the waters from the surface of the mer de glace, and the glacier itself, which find their way down through the chasms, gather in the deepest portion of the valley, and, rushing on over the rocks beneath the ice, reach, finally, the front of the glacier, where they bubble up like a huge, seething caldron—a Stygian pool of fearful aspect. This muddy water discolors that side of the fiord all the way to the sea; a circumstance which I was quite at a loss to account for until I had actually witnessed the cause of it, and seen the Panther carried, by the force of the current, bodily off from the glacier against the action of her helm.
I have mentioned the irregularity of the line of the glacier front. It presented numerous projecting angles. Near the centre, it forms almost a right angle. Thus do we observe how much more rapidly the centre of the glacier moves than its sides.
Having reached the southern shore, we discovered the water to shoal very rapidly at thirty fathoms from the rocks, showing that there was a wide shelf there; and, upon ascertaining that it was good holding-ground, and finding nineteen fathoms, we anchored, and swung into the stream, which was there found to flow at the rate of four knots, thus accounting for our inability to cross over without drifting away from the glacier. Our anchorage was a hundred fathoms only from the ice-cliff, and this rising two hundred feet above the surface of the water, it seemed, at that short distance, to be hanging almost over us. To one at all familiar with the tricks of glaciers it was evident, from the first, that the situation was one of danger. But the captain, who was solely responsible for the vessel, appeared to like his holding-ground, which was thick mud, and said that if we were going to stay at the glacier, there’s where the Panther must continue, for there was no other anchorage, as he could see. It was accordingly determined to take the risks, such as they might be, and hold on there until the morning, at the least.
We went ashore after supper and, climbing over the rugged rocks, ascended to the summit of a hill twelve hundred feet above the sea, and saw the sun go down behind the mountains; and against the brightness of the sky, in the lingering twilight, we beheld the great ice-sea of Greenland, lighted with the gorgeous tintings of the clouds. Oh, what a sight it was!—that desert waste—its cold, hard surface glittering with a borrowed splendor, and taking to itself the robes of heaven, as if to cheat the memory of its right to hold it as the very type of what might ever bear the name of Desolate.
CHAPTER V.
CROSSING THE GLACIER.
The night did not prove promising for the safety of the Panther. At intervals alarming sounds proceeded from the glacier, and now and then a quick sharp crack, followed by a heavy thud, would tell us that a mass had split from it and fallen to the sea, which in the morning was covered with small fragments that had been thus disengaged; and masses, some of them of considerable size, were drifting past the vessel with the current.
At an early hour I set out to cross the fiord, accompanied by the captain, with the purpose of seeking a harbor, or at least a more safe anchorage. Owing to the loose ice, the passage was not accomplished without difficulty. In many places the boat could not be propelled with oars, and we were obliged to push our way along by main force, using the boat-hooks and the oars as poles.