SIZE OF THE ICEBEEGS. 41 



Tke larger masses detaclied from tlie glaciers are known under the 

 name of icebergs. Dr. Wallich was able to measure some of tliem on 

 tbe coasts of Greenland, by ascertaining the depth below water of the 

 bank on which several of these moving bergs had been stranded ; 

 and he found that, with the regularly formed blocks, the part above 

 the level of the sea is never more than the fourteenth or sixteenth 

 part of that beneath the level of the water. With respect to the 

 masses whose exposed portions terminate in a cone or a pyramid, 

 they descend to a less depth, in proportion as they present a more 

 considerable bulk above water. But the total height of the iceberg 

 always exceeds by seven or eight times the visible portion. 



By these proportions, mariners can judge of the real size of the icy 

 masses which they see stranded on the coasts of Newfoundland, or melt- 

 ino. slowly as they float far out into the Atlantic. Enormous blocks 

 ha^ve been seen from 300 to 400 feet high, so that these fragments 

 of glaciers measured more than 3,000 feet from summit to base ; that 

 is to say, an elevation equal to the highest mountains of England or 

 Ireland. One of these masses which was encountered by the ship 

 Acadia off the bank of Newfoundland, amidst a labyrinth of other 

 floatino. mountains, was about 480 feet high, surmounted by a kmd 

 of dome resembling St. Paul's Cathedral in a most singular manner. 

 Twenty days later, when on her homeward voyage, the Acadia found 

 the same iceberg 68 miles more to the south. A great number 

 of these travelling masses have been seen, measuring several miles 

 in length and breadth, whose bulk amounted to tens of thousands 

 of cubic yards. As to fragments of ice-fields, some have been 

 met with measuring not less than from 50 to 100 miles in each 



direction. . . , 



The slow movement of the block observed by the Acadia, which 

 only advanced a little more than three miles per day, proves that 

 icebergs offer considerable resistance to the current which carries 

 them. The checks to which they are subject on the way, such as 

 partial strandings, or when the surface and under currents urge 

 them in opposite directions, retard their speed considerably, and often 

 change them into seemingly stationary islets. Towards the end of 

 IBSs'^an unexpected circumstance, still more remarkable than that 

 of the berg seen by the Acadia, shows us exactly what had 

 been the progress of an iceberg during the space of more than a 

 year. An American whaler sailing in Davis's Strait perceived a dark 

 mass in the middle of a group of floating peaks ; this mass was the 

 ship Rewhde which the British Government had sent out in search 



