PRINCE WILLIAM SOUND 



67 



towering peaks spread before us on every hand — a day 

 that gave us another feast of beauty and sublimity and 

 that stands out in the memory unforgetable ! We were 

 afloat in an enchanted circle; we sailed over magic seas 

 under magic skies; we played hide and seek with winter 

 in lucid sunshine over blue and emerald waters — all the 

 conditions, around, above, below us were most fortunate. 



Prince William Sound is shaped like a 

 great spider: an open irregular body of 

 water eighty miles or more across, fringed 

 by numerous arms and inlets that reach 

 far in amid the mountains. Across the 

 head of most of these arms are huge gla- 

 ciers; others hang upon the mountain 

 sides or cascade down them 

 toward the head of 

 one of these inlets 

 that we were now 

 bound. In the af- 

 ternoon we reach- 

 ed its head and saw 

 another palisade of 

 shattered ice, about 

 two hundred feet 

 high and four miles 

 long, barring our 

 way. We named 

 this the Columbia 

 Glacier. Its front 

 was quite as impos- 

 ing as that of the Muir, but it was less active; apparently 

 no large blue bergs are born out of its depth, for the 

 reason, doubtless, that its depth is not great. On a 

 wooded island near its front we left two of our geolo- 

 gists to survey and report upon it. At eight o'clock that 



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PART OF FRONT OF COLUMBIA GLACIER. 



