400 A SUMMER STORM. 



cliffs gives a very un-June-like aspect to the prospect 

 from the deck. The wind is southerly, and the waves, 

 coming into the bay with no other resistance than 

 that given by a few icebergs, begin to shake the ice 

 about the schooner, and we can see the pulsations of 

 the seas in the old fire-hole. I should not much relish 

 seeing the ice crumbling to pieces about us in the 

 midst of such a storm. 



June 27th. 



The storm continues, — occasional rain, mixed up 

 with a great deal of hail. The scene from the deck, 

 to seaward, was so wild that I was tempted to the 

 nearest island, (the only one of the three not in open 

 water.) to get a better view of it. I had much trouble 

 facing the wind, and was nearly blown into the sea, 

 and the hail cut the face terribly. The little flowers, 

 which had been seduced by the warm sun of last week 

 into unveiling their modest faces, seemed shrinking 

 and dejected. 



I was, however, repaid for some discomfort by the 

 scene which I have brought back in my memory, and 

 which is to go down on a sheet of clean white paper 

 that is now drying on a drawing-board which I owe to 

 McCormick's ingenuity. I have not seen the equal 

 of this storm except once — a memorable occasion — 

 last year, when we w^ere fighting our way into Smith 

 Sound. The wind seemed, as it did then, ftxirly to 

 shovel the water up and pitch it through the air, until 

 it had to stop from sheer exhaustion, and then I could 

 see away off under a dark cloud a vast multitude of 

 white specks creeping from the gloom, and moving 

 along in solid phalanx, magnifying as they came, and 

 charging the icebergs, hissing over their very sum- 

 mits, or breaking their heads upon the islands, or 



