256 ACCOUNT OF THE ARCTIC REGIONS. 



the appearance of advancing to windward, because 

 every other description of ice moves rapidly past 

 them, on account of its finding less resistance from 

 the water, and consequently drifting faster to lee- 

 ward, in proportion as its depth beneath the surface 

 is diminished. From the ice-berg's firmness, it often 

 affords a stable mooring to a ship in strong adverse 

 winds, or when a state of rest is required for the 

 performance of the different operations attendant on 

 a successful fishery. The fisher likewise avails him- 

 self of this quiescent property, when his ship is in- 

 commoded or rendered unmanageable by the accu- 

 mulation of drift ice around, when his object is to 

 gain a windward situation more open. He moors 

 under the lee of the ice-berg, — the loose ice soon 

 forces past, — the ship remains nearly stationary, — 

 and the wished-for effect seldom fails to result. 

 Mooring to lofty ice-bergs, is attended with consi- 

 derable danger : being sometimes finely balanced, 

 they are apt to be overturned ; and, while floating 

 in a tide-way, should their base be arrested by the 

 ground, their detrusion necessarily follows, attended 

 with a thundering noise, and the crushing of every 

 object they encounter in their descent. Thus have 

 vessels been often staved, and sometimes wrecked by 

 the fall of their icy mooring ; while smaller objects, 

 such as boats, have been repeatedly overwhelmed, 

 even at a considerable distance, by the vast waves 

 occasioned by such events. 



