COMMOTION OF THE ICE. 
279 
well march. The water-lane of yesterday is covered 
by four-inch ice ; the floes at its margin more than 
three feet thick. These have been closing for some 
time by a sliding, grinding movement, one upon the 
other ; but every now and then coming together more 
directly, the thinner ice clattering between them, and 
marking their new outline with hummock ridges. 
They have been fairly in contact for the last hour : we 
feel their pressure extending to us through the elastic 
floe in which we are cradled. There is a quivering, 
vibratory hum about the timbers of the brig, and ev- 
ery now and then a harsh rubbing creak along her 
sides, like waxed cork on a mahogany table. The 
hummocks are driven to within four feet of our coun- 
ter, and stand there looming fourteen feet high through 
the darkness. It has been a horrible commotion so 
far, with one wild, booming, agonized note, made up 
of a thousand discords ; and now comes the deep still- 
ness after it, the mysterious ice-pulse, as if the ener- 
gies were gathering for another strife. 
" 6i A.M. Another pulse ! the vibration greater than 
we have ever yet had it. If our little brig had an an- 
imated centre of sensation, and some rude force had 
torn a nerve-trunk, she could not feel it more — she 
fairly shudders. Looking out to the north, this ice 
seems to heave up slowly against the sky in black 
hills ; and as we watch them rolling toward us, the 
hills sink again, and a distorted plain of rubbish melts 
before us into the night. Ours is the contrast of ut- 
ter helplessness with illimitable power. 
" 9 50 A.M. Brooks and myself took advantage of 
the twilight at nine o'clock to cross the hummocky 
fields to the Rescue. I can not convey an impression 
of the altered aspects of the floe. Our frozen lane has 
