PHENOMENA OF THE OCEAN.

“They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters; these see the works of the Lord, and his wonders in the deep.”—Psalms.

“With wonder mark the moving wilderness of waves,From pole to pole through boundless space diffused,Magnificently dreadful! where, at large,Leviathan, with each inferior nameOf sea-born kinds, ten thousand thousand tribes,Find endless range for pasture and for sport.Adoring ownThe Hand Almighty, who in channeled bedImmeasurable sunk, and poured abroad,Fenced with eternal mounds, the fluid sphere;With every wind to waft large commerce on.Join pole to pole, consociate severed worlds,And link in bonds of intercourse and loveEarth’s universalfamily.”family.”—Mallet.

“With wonder mark the moving wilderness of waves,

From pole to pole through boundless space diffused,

Magnificently dreadful! where, at large,

Leviathan, with each inferior name

Of sea-born kinds, ten thousand thousand tribes,

Find endless range for pasture and for sport.

Adoring own

The Hand Almighty, who in channeled bed

Immeasurable sunk, and poured abroad,

Fenced with eternal mounds, the fluid sphere;

With every wind to waft large commerce on.

Join pole to pole, consociate severed worlds,

And link in bonds of intercourse and love

Earth’s universalfamily.”family.”—Mallet.

That huge mass of waters impregnated with salt, which encompasses all parts of the globe, and by the means of which, in the present improved state of navigation, an easy intercourse subsists between the most distant nations, is denominated the ocean, and has three grand divisions assigned to it. First, that vast expanse of water which lies to the westward of the northern and southern continents of America, and by which those continents are divided from Asia. On account of the uniform and temperate gales which sweep its surface within the tropics, it is named the Pacific ocean; and has again been distinguished into the northern and southern Pacific, (the equator being considered as the dividing line,) and the Southern ocean, or South sea, being consequently that part of the general assemblage of waters which is contained between the fortieth degree of south latitude and the south pole. Its general width is estimated at about ten thousand miles. Secondly, the Atlantic ocean, which divides Europe and Africa from the two American continents, and has a general width of about three thousand miles; while the waters which occupy the polar regions are named the Northern sea. And, lastly, the Indian ocean, which extends from the eastern shores of Africa along the southern coasts of Asia, and has the same general width with the preceding one.

Among the chief of those less expansive sheets of water, properly called seas, may be mentioned the Baltic, the Mediterranean sea, and the Black andRed seas. The Caspian sea, being entirely encompassed by land, might, with more propriety, have been styled a lake; but as its water possesses the quality of saltness, it is ranked among the seas. It is, notwithstanding, certain that Lake Superior has a still greater circumference, extending around its shores at least fourteen hundred miles, while the extent of the Caspian does not exceed twelve hundred.

Of the origin of this division into different seas, and seas of different depths, little is known; but it is highly probable that many of the larger excavations and partitions now met with, have existed, without much change as to their extent, from the creation. Others have undoubtedly been the result of that conflict which is perpetually taking place between the elements of land and water, and which has, for the greater part, given rise to islands, isthmuses and peninsulas; while subterraneous volcanoes, and the truly surprising and indefatigable exertions of coral, madrepores, tubipores, and other restless and multitudinous zoöphytes, have laid, and are daily laying, the foundation of new islands and continents in the middle of the widest and deepest seas.

The quantity of water in the ocean, not only remains constantly the same, but, notwithstanding its most violent and incessant motion, continues stable within certain limits. This, however, can not be inferred from observation; for, although in the almost infinite variety of disturbances to which the ocean is liable, from the action of irregular causes, it may appear to return to its former state of equilibrium, still it may be apprehended that some extraordinary cause may communicate to it a shock, which, though inconsiderable at first, may augment continually, and elevate it above the highest mountains. It is, therefore, interesting to investigate the conditions which are necessary for the absolute stability of the ocean. This has been effected by the celebrated Laplace, who has demonstrated that the equilibrium of the oceanmustbe stable, if the density belessthan the mean density of the earth, which is known to be the case. He has likewise determined, by means of his refined analysis, that this stability would cease to exist, if the mean density of the seawere to exceedthat of the earth; so that the stability of the equilibrium of the ocean, and the excess of the density of the terrestrial globe above that of the waters which cover it, are reciprocally connected with each other, and indicate infinite wisdom and contrivance in such an adjustment.

Of the various phenomena of the sea, that of itssaltnessis one of the most obvious. No questions concerning the natural history of our globe havebeen discussed with more attention, or decided with less satisfaction, than that concerning its primary cause, which had perplexed the philosophers before the time of Aristotle, and surpassed even the great genius of that profound inquirer into natural causes. Kircher, after having consulted not less than thirty-three authors on this subject, could not help remarking, that the fluctuations of the ocean itself were scarcely more various than the opinions concerning the origin of its saline impregnation.

This question does not seem capable of admitting an illustration from experiment; at least, not from any experiments hitherto made for that purpose: it is, therefore, not surprising, that it remains nearly as problematical in the present age, as it has been in any of the preceding. Had observations been made three or four centuries ago, to ascertain the saltness of the sea, then, at any particular time and place, we might now, by making similar observations at the same place, in the same season, have been able to know, whether the saltness, at that particular place, was increasing or decreasing, or an invariable quantity. This kind and degree of knowledge would have served as a clue to direct us to a full investigation of this matter in general. It is to be regretted, however, that observations of this nature have not, in former days, been made with any degree of precision.

One of the principal opinions maintained on this subject by modern philosophers, and more particularly supported by Halley, is, that since river-water, in almost every part of the globe, is impregnated in a greater or less degree by sea-salt, the sea must have gradually acquired its present quantity of salt from the long continued influx of rivers. The water which is carried into the sea by these rivers, is again separated from it by evaporation, and being dispersed over the atmosphere by winds, soon descends in rain or vapor upon the surface of the earth, whence it hastens to pour into the bosom of the ocean the fresh tribute of salt it has collected in its inland progress. Thus the salt conveyed into the sea not being a volatile substance, nor performing an incessant circulation, must be a perpetually increasing quantity; and sufficient time, it is contended, has elapsed since the creation, for the sea to acquire, from this source, its present quantity of salt.

This opinion has been successfully combated; and it is denied that freshwater rivers could, in the course of thousands or even millions of years, have produced saltness in the sea. If this were the case, every sea, or great body of water, which receives rivers, must have been salt, and have possessed a degree of saltness in proportion to the quantity of water which these rivers discharge. But so far is this from being true, that the Palus Mæotis, and our great American lakes, do not contain salt water, but fresh. It may indeed be objected, that the quantity of salt which rivers carry along withthem, and deposit in the sea, must depend on the nature of the soil through which they flow, which may in some places not contain any salt; and that this is the reason why the great lakes in America and the Palus Mæotis are fresh. But to this opinion, which is merely hypothetical, there are insurmountable objections. It is a curious fact, that the saltness of the sea is greatest under the equator, and diminishes gradually toward the poles; but it can not therefore be assumed that the earth contains more salt in the tropical regions than in the temperate zones, and more in these again than in the frigid zones. On the other hand, if it be allowed that the sea receives its saltness from the rivers, it must be equally salt, or nearly so, in every part of the earth; since, according to a simple and well-known principle in chemistry,when any substance is dissolved in water with the assistance of agitation, at whatever part of the water it is introduced, it will be equally diffused through the whole liquid. Now, though it were true that a greater quantity of salt should have been introduced into the sea under the equator, than toward the poles, from the constant agitation occasioned by the wind and tide, the salt must have soon pervaded the whole mass of water. Neither is this greater proportion of saltness owing to a superior degree of heat, since it is an established principle in chemistry, that cold water and hot water dissolve nearly the same proportion of salt.

The saltness of the sea has also been ascribed to the solution of subterraneous mines of salt, that are supposed to abound in the bottom of the sea, and along its shores. But this hypothesis can not be supported. If the sea were constantly dissolving salt, it would soon become saturated; for it can not be said that it is deprived of any portion of its salt by evaporation, since rain-water is fresh. If the sea were to become saturated, neither fishes nor vegetables could live in it. It may hence be inferred that the saltness of the sea can not be accounted for by secondary causes, andthat it has been salt since the beginning of time. It is indeed impossible to suppose that the waters of the sea were at any time fresh since the formation of fishes and sea-plants; neither will they live in water which is fresh. It may hence be concluded that the saltness of the sea has, with some few exceptions, perhaps arising from mines of rock-salt dispersed near its shores, been nearly the same in all ages. This hypothesis, which is the simplest, and is involved in the fewest difficulties, best explains the various phenomena dependent on the saltness of the sea.

Although this saline property may be one of the causes by which the waters of the sea are preserved from putridity, still it can not be considered as the principal cause. The ocean has, like rivers, its currents, by which its contents are circulated round the globe; and these may be said to be the greatagents which keep it sweet and wholesome. A very enlightened navigator, Sir John Hawkins, speaks of a calm, in which the sea, having continued for some time without motion, assumed a very formidable aspect. “Were it not,” he observes, “for the moving of the sea by the force of winds, tides and currents, it would corrupt all the world. The experiment of this I saw in the year 1590, lying with a fleet about the islands of the Azores, almost six months, the greater part of which time we were becalmed. Upon which, all the sea became so replenished with various sorts of gellies, and forms of serpents, adders and snakes, as seemed wonderful; some green, some black, some yellow, some white, some of divers colors, and many of them had life; and some there were a yard and a half, and two yards long; which, had I not seen, I could hardly have believed. And hereof are witnesses all the companies of the ships which were then present; so that hardly a man could draw a bucket of water clear of some corruption. In which voyage, toward the end thereof, many of every ship fell sick, and began to die apace. But the speedy passage into our country, was a remedy to the diseased, and a preservative to those who were not touched.”

Although the assertion that salt water never freezes, has been contradicted by repeated experience, it is still certain that it requires a much greater degree of cold to produce its congelation, than fresh water. It is, therefore, one of the greatest blessings which we derive from this element, that when we find all the stores of nature locked up to us on the land, the sea is, with few exceptions, ever open to our necessities. It is well known that at particular seasons, the mouth of the river St. Lawrence, the entrance into the Baltic sea, &c., are so much frozen over as to be impassable by ships; while the vast mountains and fields of ice in the polar regions, have for ages past been insurmountable obstructions to the daring researches of modern navigators. These exceptions, however, will appear of comparatively trifling importance to navigation, when the number of ports which are, in almost every region, open at all seasons of the year, are considered; and this facility of intercourse would certainly not have been afforded, if sea-water had admitted of as easy a congelation as that of water not impregnated with salt.

On the origin of ice in the frozen seas, different opinions have been entertained. The authority of Capt. Cook and Lord Mulgrave, has been cited by Bishop Watson, to show that good fresh water may be procured from ice found in those seas; but he observes that, notwithstanding the testimoniesof these very able navigators, it may still be doubted whether the ice from which the water was obtained, had been formed in the sea, and, consequently, whether sea-water itself would, when frozen, yield fresh water. He thinks it probable that the ice had either been formed at the mouths of large fresh-water rivers, and had thence, by tides or torrents been drifted into the sea, or that it had been broken by its own weight, from the immense cliffs of ice and frozen snow which, in countries where there are few rivers, are found in high latitudes to project a great way into the sea. An early navigator, Fotherbye, in the relation of his voyage toward the south pole, in 1614, considers snow to be the original cause of the ice found at sea, he himself having observed it to lie an inch thick on the surface; and Captain Cook, from his own observation in the South sea, was disposed to think that the vast floats of ice he met with in the spring, were formed from the congelation of snow. It is certain that the snow which falls upon the surface of the sea, being in a solid state, and, bulk for bulk, lighter than sea-water, will not readily combine with it, but may, by a due degree of cold in the atmosphere, be speedily converted into a layer of ice. The upper layer of this first surface of ice being elevated above the surface of the sea, will receive all the fresh water which falls from the atmosphere in the form of snow, sleet, rain or dew, by the successive congelation of which, the largest fields of ice may at length be formed.

It is a matter of little consequence to a navigator, whence the ice which supplies him with fresh water is produced. Leaving, therefore, these hypotheses relative to the formation of ice in frozen seas, it should be observed that the question, whether congealed sea-water will, when thawed, yield fresh water, has been satisfactorily decided by experiments made with every suitable attention. A quantity of sea-water having been taken up off the English coast, was exposed to a freezing atmosphere, and afforded an ice perfectly free from any taste of salt; and it has likewise been found, that not only sea-water, but water containing double the proportion of salt commonly found in our sea-water, and more than is contained in the sea-water of any climate, may be frozen by the cold prevailing in our atmosphere.

ICEBERGS, OR ICE-ISLANDS.

Ice-islands, or icebergs, as they are commonly called, is the name given by seamen to the huge, solid masses of ice which abound in the sea near or within the polar circles, and which often float down nearer to the equator, till they are gradually dissolved by the increasing warmth of the air and water. The cut gives a view of them as seen by Dr. Scoresby, who countedfive hundred of them between latitude sixty-nine degrees and seventy degrees north, which were from one hundred to two hundred feet high, and from a few yards to a mile in circumference. Many of these fluctuating islands are met with on the coasts of Spitzbergen, to the great danger of the vessels employed in the Greenland fishery. In the midst of these tremendous masses, navigators have been arrested and frozen to death. In this manner the brave Sir Hugh Willoughby perished, with all his crew, in 1553; and in the year 1773, Lord Mulgrave, after every effort which the most accomplished seaman could make, to reach the termination of his voyage, was caught in the ice, and nearly experienced the same unhappy fate. The scene he describes, divested of the horrors attendant on the eventful expectation of change, was most beautiful and picturesque. Two large ships becalmed in a vast basin, surrounded on all sides by ice-islands of various forms; the weather clear; the sun gilding the circumambient ice, which was smooth, low, even, and covered with snow, except where pools of water, on a portion of the surface, shot forth new icy crystals, and on the smooth surface of the comparatively small space of sea in which they were hemmed.Such is the picture drawn by our navigator, amid the perils by which lie was surrounded.

After fruitless attempts to force their way through the fields of ice, the limits of these became at length so contracted, that the ships were immovably fixed. The smooth extent of surface was soon lost; the pressure of the pieces of ice, by the violence of the swell, caused them to pack; and fragment rose upon fragment, until they were in many places higher than the main-yard. The movements of the ships were tremendous and involuntary, in conjunction with the surrounding ice, actuated by the currents. The water having shoaled to fourteen fathoms, great apprehensions were entertained, as the grounding of the ice, or of the ships, would have been equally fatal: the force of the ice might have crushed them to atoms, or have lifted them out of the water, and have overset them; or, again, have left them suspended on the summits of the pieces of ice, at a tremendous hight, exposed to the fury of the winds, or to the risk of being dashed to pieces by the failure of their frozen dock. An attempt was made to cut a passage through the ice; but after a perseverance truly worthy of Britons, it proved ineffectual. The commander, who was at all times master of himself, directed the boats to be made ready to be hauled over the ice, till they should reach navigable water, proposing in them to make the voyage to England; but after they had thus been drawn over the ice, for three progressive days, a wind having sprung up, the ice separated sufficiently to yield to the pressure of the ships in full sail. After having labored against the resisting fields of ice, they at length reached the harbor of Smeerinberg, at the west end of Spitzbergen.

The vast islands of floating ice which abound in the high southern latitudes, are a proof that they are visited by a much severer degree of cold than equal latitudes toward the north pole. Captain Cook, in his second voyage, fell in with one of these islands in latitude fifty degrees, forty minutes, south. It was about fifty feet high, and half a mile in circuit, being flat on the top, while its sides, against which the sea broke exceedingly high, rose in a perpendicular direction. In the afternoon of the same day, the tenth of December, 1773, he fell in with another large cubical mass of ice, about two thousand feet in length, four hundred feet in breadth, and in hight two hundred feet. Mr. Foster, the naturalist of the voyage, remarks that, according to the experiments of Boyle and Marian, the volume of ice is to that of sea-water as ten to nine: consequently, by the known rules of hydrostatics, the volume of ice which rises above the surface of the water, is to that which sinks below it as one to nine. Supposing, therefore, this mass of ice to have been of a regular figure, its depth under water must have been eighteen hundred feet, and its whole hight, twenty hundred feet: estimatingits length, as above, at twenty hundred feet, and its breadth at four hundred feet, the entire mass must have contained sixteen hundred millions of cubic feet of ice.

Two days after, several other ice-islands were seen, some of them nearly two miles in circuit, and six hundred feet high; and yet such was the force of the waves, that the sea broke quite over them. They exhibited for a few moments a view very pleasing to the eye; but a sense of danger soon filled the mind with horror; for had the ship struck against the weather-side of one of these islands, when the sea ran high, she must in an instant have been dashed to pieces. The route to the southward was afterward impeded by an immense field of low ice, the termination of which could not be seen, either to the east, west or south. In different parts of this field were islands, or hills of ice, like those which had before been found floating in the sea.

At length these ice-islands became as familiar to those on board as the clouds and the sea. Whenever a strong reflection of white was seen on the skirts of the sky, near the horizon, then ice was sure to be encountered; notwithstanding which, that substance itself was not entirely white, but often tinged, especially near the surface of the sea, with a most beautiful sapphirine, or rather berylline blue, evidently reflected from the water. This blue color sometimes appeared twenty or thirty feet above the surface, and was probably produced by particles of sea-water which had been dashed against the mass in tempestuous weather, and had penetrated into its interstices. In the evening, the sun setting just behind one of these masses, tinged its edges with gold, and reflected on the entire mass a beautiful suffusion of purple. In the larger masses, were frequently observed shades or casts of white, lying above each other in strata, sometimes of six inches, and at other times of a foot in hight. This appearance seemed to confirm the opinion entertained relative to the increase and accumulation of such huge masses of ice, by heavy falls of snow at different intervals; for snow being of various kinds, small-grained, large-grained, in light feathery locks, &c., the various degrees of its compactness may account for the different colors of the strata.

In his third attempt to proceed southward, in January, 1774, Capt. Cook was led, by the mildest sunshine which was, perhaps, ever experienced in the frigid zone, to entertain hopes of penetrating as far toward the south pole as other navigators have done toward the north pole; but on the twenty-sixth of that month, at four in the morning, his officers discovered a solid ice-field of immense extent before them, bearing from east to west. A bed of fragments floated around this field, which was raised several feet abovethe surface of the water. While in this situation, the southern part of the horizon was illuminated by the rays of light reflected from the ice, to a considerable hight. Ninety-seven ice-islands were distinctly seen within the field, besides those on the outside; many of them very large, and looking like a ridge of mountains, rising one above the other until they were lost in the clouds. The most elevated and most ragged of these ice-islands, were surmounted by peaks, and were from two to three hundred feet in hight, with perpendicular cliffs or sides astonishing to behold. The largest of them terminated in a peak not unlike the cupola of St. Paul’s.

The outer, or northern edge of this immense field of ice, was composed of loose or broken ice, closely packed together, so that it was not possible to find any entrance. Such mountains of ice, Captain Cook was persuaded, were never seen in the Greenland seas, so that no comparison could be drawn; and it was the opinion of most of the persons on board, that this ice extended quite to the pole, from which they were then less than nineteen degrees; or, perhaps, that it was joined to some land to which it had been fixed from the earliest time. Our navigator was of opinion that it is to the south of this parallel that all the ice is formed which is found scattered up and down to the northward, and afterward broken off by gales of wind, or other causes, and brought forward by the currents which are always found to set in that direction in high latitudes. “Should there,” he observes, “be land to the south behind this ice, it can afford no better retreat for birds, or any other animals, than the ice itself, with which it must be wholly covered. I, who was ambitious, not only to go further than any one had been before, but as far as it was possible for man to go, was not sorry at meeting with this interruption; as it in some measure relieved us, or at least shortened the dangers and hardships inseparable from the navigation of the southern polar regions.”

The approximation of several fields of ice of different magnitudes, produces a very singular phenomenon. The smaller of these masses are forced out of the water, and thrown on the larger ones, until at length an aggregate is formed of a tremendous hight. These accumulated bodies of ice float in the sea like so many rugged mountains, and are continually increased in hight by the freezing of the spray of the sea, and the melting and then freezing of the snow which falls on them. While their growth is thus augmented, the smaller fields, of a less elevation, are the meadows of the seals, on which these animals at times frolic by hundreds.

The collision of great fields of ice, in high latitudes, is often attended by a noise, which, for a time, takes away the sense of hearing anything beside; and that of the smaller fields, with a grinding of unspeakable horror. Thewater which dashes against the mountainous ice, freezes into an infinite variety of forms, and presents to the admiring view of the voyager ideal towns, streets, churches, steeples, and almost every form which imagination can picture to itself.

After such notices of the ice-islands from the earlier voyagers, it may be interesting to know how they have appeared to later beholders; and this may be seen in the following account from the journal of a seaman who was in the well known “Arctic Expedition,” in 1850-51. Under the date of the thirtieth of June, 1850, he writes: “Moored to an iceberg; weather calm; sky cloudless, and ‘beautifully blue;’ surrounded by a vast number of stupendous bergs, glittering and glistening beneath the refulgent rays of a midday sun. A great portion of the crew had gone on shore to gather the eggs of the wild sea-birds that frequent the lonely ice-bound precipices of Baffin’s bay, while those on board had retired to rest, wearied with the harassing toils of the preceding day. To me, walking the deck and alone, all nature seemed hushed in universal repose. Whilst thus contemplating the stillness of the monotonous scene around me, I observed in the offing a large iceberg, completely perforated, exhibiting in the distance an arch, or tunnel, apparently so uniform in its conformation, that I was induced to call two of the seamen to look at it, at the same time telling them, that I had never read or heard of any of our arctic voyagers passing through one of these arches, so frequently seen through large bergs, and that there would be a novelty in doing so; and if they chose to accompany me, I would get permission to take the small boat, and endeavor to accomplish the unprecedented feat.

“They readily agreed, and away we went. On nearing the arch, and ascertaining that there was a sufficiency of water for the boat to pass through, we rowed slowly and silently under, when there burst upon our view one of the most magnificent specimens of nature’s handiwork ever exhibited to mortal eyes; the sublimity and grandeur of which no language can describe, no imagination conceive. Fancy an immense arch of eighty feet span, fifty feet high, and upward of one hundred feet in breadth, as correct in its conformation as if it had been constructed by the most scientific artist, formed of solid ice, of a beautiful emerald green, its whole expanse of surface smoother than the most polished alabaster, and you may form some slight conception of the architectural beauties of this icy temple, the wonderful workmanship of time and the elements. When we had got about half-way through the mighty structure, on looking upward, I observed that the berg was rent the whole breadth of the arch, and in a perpendicular direction to its summit, showing two vertical sections of irregular surfaces, ‘darkly, deeply, beautifully blue,’ here and there illuminated by an arctic sun, whichdarted its golden rays between, presenting to the eye a picture of ethereal grandeur, which no poet could describe, no painter portray. I was so enraptured with the sight, that for a moment I fancied the ‘blue vault of heaven’ had opened, and that I actually gazed upon the celestial splendor of a world beyond this. But, alas! in an instant the scene changed, and I awoke as it were from a delightful dream, to experience all the horrors of a terrible reality. I observed the fracture rapidly close, then again slowly open. This stupendous mass of ice, millions of tuns in weight, was afloat, consequently in motion, and apparently about to lose its equilibrium, capsize, or burst into fragments.

“Our position was truly awful. My feelings at the moment may be conceived, but can not be described. I looked downward and around me; the sight was equally appalling; the very sea seemed agitated. I at last shut my eyes from a scene so terrible, the men at the oars, as if by instinct, ‘gave way,’ and our little craft swiftly glided from beneath the gigantic mass. We then rowed round the berg, keeping at a respectful distance from it, in order to judge of its magnitude. I supposed it to be about a mile in circumference, and its highest pinnacle two hundred and fifty feet. Thus ended an excursion, the bare recollection of which, at this moment, awakens in me a shudder; nevertheless, I would not have lost the opportunity of witnessing a scene so awfully sublime, so tragically grand, for thousands of pounds, but I would not again run such a risk for a world. We passed through the berg about two P. M., and at ten o’clock the same night, it burst, agitating the sea for miles around. I may also observe, that the two men who were with me in the boat, did not observe that the berg was rent until I told them, after we were out of danger, we having agreed, previously to entering the arch, not to speak a word to each other, lest echo itself should disturb the fragile mass.”

As further describing the appearances of icebergs, we give the following narrative by Mr. Abbott, who himself was a witness of the splendid scenery he so graphically describes. He says: “The trip of the Baltic, in March, 1854, is likely to be somewhat memorable. We left Sandy Hook, on Sunday morning, the fifth, and had a propitious and rapid run, until Friday the tenth, about three o’clock. When in latitude forty-six degrees and longitude forty-eight degrees, our attention was arrested by some small pieces of broken ice, floating in every direction around us. The weather was thick and hazy, so that we could nowhere see the horizon. In the course of an hour or two, the fog partly disappeared, and we found ourselves nearly half-surrounded by an immense field of drift-ice, and large numbers of icebergs, extending from north-east by south to south-west.

“Our speed was immediately slackened, and the course of the ship changed to the northward and westward. It soon appeared that we were completely hemmed in on every side, by immense fields of floating drift, sometimes in loose and broken masses, sometimes in a compact and immovable jam, and everywhere studded with vast and towering icebergs, of almost every conceivable form and size.

“The fog gradually lifted, now in one direction, and now in another, just sufficient to discover to us, that we were fairly surrounded, and that, to whatever point of the compass we could turn the eye or the ship, interminable masses of drift-ice, of uplift, and icebergs, seemed to cover the sea. So sudden and unexpected was this discovery, that it seemed more like fairy work than reality. Surprise and astonishment, at the novel and wonderful scene around us, seemed at first to make us all unconscious of our own critical situation. Separating from it the idea of danger, it would be difficult to imagine a scene combining and blending more of the elements of beauty, grandeur and sublimity. Far as the eye could reach, it was no longer sea and sky, but ice, ice, ice, floating like an archipelago of a thousand isles, great and small, of highland and lowland, mountain, peninsula, promontory, and Gibraltar rock.

“Running in countless directions through these masses, the ocean waves appeared in narrow but doubly dark currents, forming the most crooked and irregular passages, of rivulet and river, and endless indentations of inlet and bay. Through these labyrinthine passages, perpetually opening and closing by the action of winds and waves, our escape was to be made. Once, in attempting to force a passage through a long but narrow neck of broken blocks of ice, which had drifted across our way, the cutwater, bows and wheels of the ship, were pretty seriously battered.

“All night long the ship was kept running slowly, threading her way through these little passages of clear water, until four o’clock in the morning, when she was so pressed on every side, with sheets of ice, crowded and packed far above the surface of the water, and urged on by the momentum of vast masses of iceberg, that prudence required to stop the engine and wait for daylight. The morning brought little cheering prospect. The man at mast-head reported no clear water, as far as the eye could reach, excepting in narrow and scarcely navigable patches and veins. The surface of the sea all around the horizon, seemed an almost unbroken plain of field and mountain ice. As early as light allowed, the ship was again under way for the largest space of clear water that could be seen, and continued all day long to retrace her path to the westward, veering her course, however, through every point of the compass, to find the intricate passages toward the open sea. Thewind, fresh from the north-west, came with intense and piercing cold. The man at the mast-head could not stand its severity more than half an hour. The masts, shrouds and cordage of the ship, were completely incrusted, and altogether what with field-ice, drift, and icebergs, snow, rain and hail, gale and storm, these days in the ice will not soon be forgotten.

“The different aspects of these scenes by day and night furnished an incessant source of interest. The vast fields of drift, in their varied forms, by daylight and by moonlight, were picturesque and beautiful in the highest degree. They ranged in extent from a quarter of a mile, to perhaps ten miles square. In some cases, the entire field seemed to be composed of small broken fragments, floating in close proximity to each other, yet yielding readily to the play of the waves, rising and falling with the swell of the sea. The superincumbent weight upon the surface of the water, diminished the elevation of the waves, but the reflected light from its uneven silver surface, revealed far more distinctly and beautifully, the extent of motion and the action of the waves. The long swells of the sea stretched away in graceful curves for miles, resembling more than anything else I can suggest, some of the rolling prairies of the west, as they must appear in snow, with this difference, that the swells seemed ‘all alive,’ as if some mighty monsters of the deep were working their way beneath, perpetually shifting their position, and vainly endeavoring to lift the load that covers them, to find a breathing in the open air. In other instances, these vast fields, stretching as far as the eye could reach over half the visible horizon, were one compact and apparently motionless mass of solid ice, as fixed as a ‘rock-bound coast.’

“Another form of peculiar interest was that of a wide field, of many miles in extent, apparently formed by a long succession of ‘uplifts.’ The action of the waves had gradually forced large blocks of ice beneath one edge, and the long continuation of this process, had lifted as it would seem, almost the entire mass, many feet out of water. The outer edge of these uplifts presented an abrupt and perpendicular wall. In one case, at night, the captain estimated that he had sailed for ten miles, along such a wall, the hight of the wheel-house, about forty feet. A very beautiful effect was once produced by a small mass of this kind. It was several miles distant, and of very considerable length. As it rolled and pitched, one side, apparently fifteen or twenty feet high, dipped in the waves, and rising again, lifted an immense volume of water, which then ran off, in a beautiful and magnificent torrent, over the rising edge. I watched with my glass for an hour, the graceful evolutions of this interesting cataract, which is probably still performing, by its regular rise and fall, a very respectable, but intermittent Niagara, in the middle of the Atlantic, with all the regularity of a pendulum.

“The icebergs, themselves, which we saw, were very numerous, and of almost every conceivable form and size. During our passage through three hundred miles, the number we observed was variously estimated from five hundred to one thousand. I counted at one time thirty-six, and at another forty-five, all of notable magnitude. They sometimes were of most curious and fantastic shapes. Hill and mountain of every imaginable outline, castle and tower, turret, and out-jutting and overhanging crags, magnificent needle forms shooting to the sky, like the spire of Trinity, crouching lions, and polar bears, trees of ice, and natural bridges, in short, you can scarcely fancy anything odd, that snow and ice can be made to resemble, that had not its type around us.

“But, perhaps, the most wonderful of all, was the great ‘plunging iceberg.’ It was a round, oblong mass of ice, estimated by careful comparison with our wheel-house, to be fifty by seventy-five feet. A side view made it appear about as large as the front of a large, double, four story dwelling. But it was as true and perfect an oval, as the most exquisitely beautiful bald head you have ever seen. It looked exactly like the upper part of a head of some gigantic being. This, as it floated past us, gradually descended in the waves, until it sunk beneath the surface. It then rose with a most majestic movement, lifting the pure white crown, to the hight of fifty feet. It presented on the whole, one of the grandest sights I ever beheld. It continued thus sinking and rising till it was out of our sight. It seemed like a creature of life, paying its respects to our noble ship.”

Analogous to the ice-fields described above, are those large bodies of ice, perhaps more properly named icebergs, which fill the valleys between the high mountains in northern latitudes. Among the most remarkable, are those of the east coast of Spitzbergen. They are seven in number, and lie at considerable distances from each other, extending through tracts unknown, in a region totally inaccessible in the internal parts. The most distant of them exhibits over the sea a front three hundred feet in hight, emulating the color of the emerald; cataracts of melted snow fall down in various parts; and black, spiral mountains, streaked with white, bound the sides, rising crag above crag, as far as the eye can reach in the background. At times immense fragments break off, and precipitate themselves into the water with a most alarming dashing. A portion of this vivid green substance was seen by Lord Mulgrave, in the voyage above referred to, to fall into the sea; and, notwithstanding it grounded in twenty-four fathoms ofwater, it spired above the surface fifty feet. Similar icebergs are frequent in all the arctic regions; and to their fall is owing the solid mountainous ice which infests those seas.

The frost sports wonderfully with these icebergs, and gives them majestic, as well as other most singular forms. Masses have been seen to assume the shape of a Gothic church, with arches, windows and doors, and all the rich drapery of that style of architecture, composed of what the writer of an Arabian tale would scarcely have ventured to introduce among the marvelous suggestions of his fancy,crystals of the richest sapphirine blue. Tables with one or more feet; and often immense flat-roofed temples, like those of Luxor, on the bank of the Nile, supported by round transparent columns of cerulean hue, float by the astonished spectator. These icebergs are the creation of ages, and acquire annually additional hight by falls of snow and rain, which latter often freezes instantly, and more than repairs the loss occasioned by the influence of the sun’s heat.

Among the phenomena which have long exercised the sagacity of philosophers, that of the luminous appearance of the surface of the sea, during the obscurity of the night, is highly curious. A variety of experiments were made by a French naturalist at Cayenne, at different seasons, to ascertain its true cause; and to him it appeared that these luminous points were produced by motion and friction alone, as he could not, with the help of the best glasses, perceive any insects floating in the water. But it would seem, from the experiments and observations of many learned men, that this phenomenon is produced by various causes, both jointly and separately. It has been proved by one set of experiments, that the putrefaction of animal substances produces light and scintillation in the sea. A little white fish placed in seawater rendered it luminous in the space of twenty-eight hours. On another hand, it is certain that there is in the sea a prodigious quantity of shining insects or animalcules, which contribute to this phenomenon. A French astronomer, M. Dangelet, who returned from Terra Australis in 1774, brought with him several kinds of worms which shine in water, when it is set in motion; and M. Rigaud affirms, that the luminous surface of the sea, from Brest to the Antilles, contains a great quantity of little, round, shining polypi, of about a quarter of a line in diameter. Other learned men, who acknowledge the existence of these luminous animals, can not, however, be persuaded to consider them as the cause of all that light and scintillation which appear on the surface of the ocean. They imagine that some substanceof a phosphoric nature, arising from putrefaction, must be admitted as one of the causes of this phenomenon. By other naturalists it has been ascribed to the oily and greasy substances with which the sea is impregnated; in proof of which a kind of fish, resembling the tunny, is cited, as being provided with an oil which shines with considerable luster.

The Abbe Nollent was convinced, by a series of experiments, that this phenomenon is caused by small animals, either by their luminous aspect, or by some liquor or effluvium which they emit. He did not, however, exclude other causes; and among these, the spawn or fry of fishes is deserving of attention. M. Dangelet, in sailing into the bay of Antongil, in the island of Madagascar, observed a prodigious quantity of fry, which covered the surface of the sea for the extent of more than a mile, and which he at first, on account of its color, mistook for a bank of sand. This immense accumulation of spawn or fry exhaled a disagreeable odor; and it should be remarked that the sea had, for some days before, appeared with uncommon splendor. The same accurate observer, perceiving the sea remarkably luminous in the road of the cape of Good Hope, during a perfect calm, remarked that the oars of the canoes produced a whitish and pearly kind of luster: when he took in his hand the water, which contained phosphorus, he discerned in it, for some minutes, globules of light as large as the heads of pins. On pressing these globules, they appeared to his touch like a soft and thin pulp; and some days after the sea was covered with entire banks of small fishes, in innumerable multitudes.

From all these facts it may be deduced, that various causes contribute to the light and scintillation of the sea; and that the light which the Cayenne naturalist attributed to agitation and friction, differs from that which is extended far and near, seeming to cover the whole surface of the ocean, and producing a very beautiful and striking appearance, particularly in the torrid zone, and in the summer season.

Alternate tides in sacred order run.—Blackmore.

Among the most wonderful phenomena of nature may be reckoned the tides of the sea. They were but little understood by the ancients, although Pliny, Ptolemy and Macrobius, were of opinion that they were influenced by the sun and moon. The former expressly says, that the cause of the ebb and flow is in the sun, which attracts the waters of the ocean; and he adds, that the waters rise in proportion to the proximity of the moon to the earth.

The phenomena of the tides have been ascribed to the principle of innate gravitation; but Sir Richard Phillips, in his theory of the system of the universe, refers them to that general law of motion which he considers as the primary and proximate cause of all phenomena, operating, in a descending series, from the rotation of the sun round the fulcrum of the solar system, to the fall of an apple to the earth. This motion being transferred through all nature from its source, serves as the efficient cause of every species of vitality, of every organic arrangement, and of all those accidents of body heretofore ascribed to attraction.

The waters of the ocean are observed to flow and rise twice a day, in which motion, or flux, which in the same direction lasts nearly six hours, the sea gradually swells, and, entering the mouths of rivers, drives back the river-waters toward their head. After a continued flux of six hours, it seems to repose for a quarter of an hour, and then begins to ebb, or retire back, for six hours more; in which time, by the subsidence of the waters, the rivers resume their usual course. After a quarter of an hour, the sea again flows and rises as before.

According to the theory of Newton, these phenomena were supposed to be produced by an imaginary power called attraction. The moon was supposed to attract the waters by the influence of an occult power inherent in all matter; just as the earth was supposed to attract the moon, the moon the earth, and the planets one another. Others, again, ridicule this idea, as unsustained and visionary, giving in their turn some theory that has no better argument to sustain it. And it is probable the time is yet future when we shall have any theory that will fully account for all the phenomena of the tides. On account of the shallowness of some seas, and the narrowness of the straits in others, there arises a great diversity in the phenomena, only to be accounted for by an exact knowledge of the place. For instance, in the English channel and the German ocean, the tide is found to flow strongest in those places that are narrowest, the same quantity of water being, in this case, driven through a smaller passage. It is often seen, therefore, rushing through a strait with great force, and considerably raised, by its rapidity, above that part of the ocean through which it runs.

The shallowness and narrowness of many parts of the sea, give rise also to a peculiarity in the tides of some parts of the world: for in many places, in the British seas in particular, the greatest swell of the tide is not while the moon is in its meridian hight, and directly over the place, but some time after it has declined thence. The sea, in this case, being obstructed, pursues the moon with what dispatch it can, but does not arrive with all its waters, until after the moon has ceased to operate. Lastly, from this shallowness of thesea, and from its being obstructed by shoals and straits, it happens that the Mediterranean, the Baltic and the Black sea, have not any sensible tides, to raise or depress them in a considerable degree.

Among the phenomena of the tides, one of the most singular is the bore, peculiar to several rivers: it is ascribed to the waters, which were before expansive, being suddenly pent up, and confined within a narrow space. This bore or impetuous rush of waters, accompanies the first flowing of the tide in the Ferret, in Somersetshire, and in the Seine, in France. It is also one of the peculiarities of the Severn, the most rapid river in England.

One of the greatest known tides is that of the Bristol channel, which sometimes flows upward of forty feet. At the mouth of the river Indus, the water rises thirty feet. The tides also are remarkably high on the coasts of Malay, in the straits of Sunda, in the Red sea, at the mouth of the river St. Lawrence, along the coasts of China and Japan, at Panama, and in the gulf of Bengal. The most remarkable tides, however, are those at Batsha, in the kingdom of Tonquin, in twenty degrees, fifty minutes, north latitude. In that port, the sea ebbs and flows once only in twenty-four hours, while in all other places there are two tides within that space. What is still more extraordinary, twice in each month, when the moon is near the equinoctial, there is not any tide, the water being for some time quite stagnant. These, with other anomalies of the tides there, Sir Isaac Newton, with peculiar sagacity, ascertained to arise from the concurrence of two tides, one from the South sea, and the other from the Indian ocean. Of each of these two tides there come successively two every day; two at one time greater, and two at another which are less. The time between the arrival of the two greater was considered by him as high tide; that between the two less, as ebb. In short, with these simple facts in his possession, that great mathematician solved every appearance, and so established his theory as to silence every opposer.

Besides the common and periodical tides, a variety of local currents are met with in different seas, on different parts of the ocean, and for the greater part at an inconsiderable distance from land. They have been usually ascribed to particular winds; but their origin is not easy to trace, as they have been occasionally found beneath the surface of the water, running in a contrary direction to the stratum above, and can not, therefore, have been owing to winds or monsoons. These particular currents have been ascribed to the immense masses of polar ice, which produce a greater degree of cold in the under than in the upper stratum of waters; and it has been suspected that there is an under-current of cold water flowing perpetually from the poles toward the equator, even where the water above flows toward the poles.The great disparity of temperature which is frequently found in deep and superficial soundings of the same space of water, is thus accounted for.

The most extraordinary current of this kind, is that of the gulf of Florida, usually called the Gulf stream, which sets along the coast of North America to the northward and eastward, and flows with an uninterrupted rapidity. It is ascribed to the trade-winds, which, blowing from the eastern quarter into the great Mexican gulf, cause there an accumulation above the common level of the sea. The water, therefore, constantly runs out by the channel where it finds least resistance, that is, through the gulf of Florida, with such force as to continue a distinct stream to a very great distance. A proof of its having thus originated is, that the water in the Gulf stream has been found to have retained a great portion of the heat it had acquired in the torrid zone.

A very singular upper current often prevails to the westward of Scilly, and is highly dangerous to ships which approach the British channel. Currents of this description are, however more frequently met with about the straits of Gibraltar, and near the West India islands, the coasts of which are so subject to counter-tides, or extraordinary currents, that it is often dangerous for boats to land. They proceed to the westward, along the coasts of Yucatan and Mexico, and running round into the gulf, return into the great ocean by the straits of Bahama, along the coasts of Florida, in order to pursue, in the north, the course ordained them by the great Author of nature. In this course the waters run with an extraordinary rapidity, passing on, however, by a motion so even and imperceptible, that their speed is not realized by the spectator. But against the shores and coasts of the various islands in their way, their progress becomes very manifest, and even dangerous, interrupting the navigation, and rendering it hardly possible to stem them in their course.

In addition to these regular currents, there are others, called counter-tides, which are observable on the sea-coasts and shores. In places where these flow, the sea rolls and dashes in an extraordinary manner, becoming furious without any apparent cause, and without being moved by any wind. The waves rise and open very high, breaking on the shore with such violence, that it is impossible for vessels to land. These counter-tides have been, by some, ascribed to the pressure of the heavy black wind-clouds which are occasionally seen to hang over an island, or over the sea where they occur, though it is far more probable that in every case they are caused by under-currents and hidden shoals, by which the ordinary currents are checked and broken so as to cause the effects described.

Somewhat similar to these, at least in its hidden cause, is the celebratedMaelstrom on the coast of Norway, a view of which is given in the cut. This is caused by the tides, in their violent passage between the Loffoden islands; and its terrors, though at all times great, are sometimes greatly increased by the winds. The roar of the sea, when the Maelstrom is in full action, is said to be terrific. It is stated that not only ships, but even whales, have been sucked into this vortex, and killed by being dashed against the hidden rocks. The following description, though imaginary, gives a correct idea of the destruction of a ship in this whirlpool.

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