°82 



ICEBERGS. 



[On. XVI. 



CH 



imbedded in an iceberg, drifting along in mid ocean in l a f 

 61° S. That part of the rock which was visible was about 

 12 feet in height, and from 5 to 6 in width, but the dark 

 colour of the surrounding ice indicated that much more of 

 the stone was concealed. The annexed drawing (fig. 25) was 

 made by Mr. Macnab, when the vessel was a quarter of a 

 mile distant."* This iceberg, one of many observed at sea on 

 the same day, was between 250 and 300 feet high, and was 

 no less than 1,400 miles from any certainly known land. It 

 is exceedingly improbable, says Mr. Darwin in his notice of 

 this phenomenon, that any land will hereafter be discovered 

 within 100 miles of the spot, and it must be remembered that 

 the erratic was still firmly fixed in ice, and may have sailed 

 for many a league farther before it dropped to the bottom. f 



Captain Sir James Ross, in his antarctic voyage, in 1841-2 

 and 3, saw multitudes of icebergs transporting stones and 

 rocks of various sizes, with frozen mud, in high southern 

 latitudes. His companion, Dr. J. Hooker, informs me that 

 he came to the conclusion, that most of the southern ice- 

 bergs have stones in them, although they are usually con- 

 cealed from view by the quantity of snow which falls upon 

 them. 



In the account given by Messrs. Dease and Simpson, of 

 their arctic discoveries in 1838, we learn that in lat. 71° N., 

 long. 156° W., they found <a long low spit, named Point 

 Barrow, composed of gravel and coarse sand, in some parts 

 more than a quarter of a mile broad, which the pressure of 

 the ice had forced up into numerous mounds, that, viewed 



a distance, assumed the appearance of huge boulder 



om 



X 



The fact is important, as showing how masses of drift ice, 

 when stranding on submarine banks, may exert a lateral 

 pressure capable of bending and dislocating any yielding 

 strata of gravel, sand or mud. The banks on which icebergs 

 occasionally run aground between Baffin's Bay and New- 

 foundland, are many hundred feet under water, and the force 

 with which they are struck will depend not so much on the 



11! 



lift 



* Journ. of Roy. Geograph. Soc. 

 vol. ix. p. 520. 



f Ibid. 



| Ibid. vol. viii. p. 221. 



