218 
ICE-OPENING. 
massive cliaracter of the up-piled tables, which pro- 
tected the inner portion of them from the air, and to 
the constant infiltration [endosmose) of salt-water at 
the ahraded margins. 
"3. The extent to which the work of super and in- 
fra position had been carried during the actions may- 
be realized, when I say that the floe-piece which sep- 
arated from us to starboard retained the exact impres- 
sion of the ship's side. There it was, with the gang- 
way stairs of ice-block masonry, looking down upon 
the dark water, and the useless embankment embrac- 
ing a sludgy ice-pool. 
"We could see table after table, m,ore properly layer 
after layer, each not more than seven inches thick, ex- 
tending down for more than twenty feet. Thus, it is 
highly probable, may be formed many of those enor- 
mous ice-tables, attributed by authors to direct and 
uninterrupted congelation. 
" The quantity of ice adhering to our port-side must 
be enormous ; for although the starboard floe, in leav- 
ing us, parted a six-inch hawser, it failed to budge us 
one inch from the icy cradle in which we are set." 
