52 
MEMOIR OE PENNANT. 
Before quitting these regions, we shall give Pen- 
nant’s description of the fantastic appearance of the 
ice. “ The forms assumed by the ice in this chill- 
ing climate, are extremely pleasing to even the most 
incurious eye. The surface of that which is con- 
gealed from the sea-water (for I must allow it two 
origins) is flat and even, hard, opake, resembling 
white sugar, and incapable of being slid on like the 
British ice. The greater pieces, or fields, are many 
leagues in length ; the lesser, are the meadows of 
the seals, on which these animals, at times, frolic 
by hundreds. The motion of the lesser pieces is 
rapid as the cuiTcnts ; the greater, which are some- 
times two hundred leagues long and sixty or eighty 
broad, move slow and majestically ; often fix for a 
time immoveable by the power of the ocean, and 
there produce, near the horizon, that bright white 
appearance called by mariners the hlink of the ice. 
The approximation of two great fields produces a 
most singular phenomenon. It forces the lesser (if 
the term can be applied to pieces of several acres 
square) out of the water, and adds them to their 
surface. A second and often a third succeeds ; so 
that the whole form an aggregate of tremendous 
height. These float in the sea, like so many rug- 
ged mountains ; and are sometimes five or six 
hundred yards thick ; but the far greater part is 
concealed beneath the water. These are continually 
increased in height by the freezing of the spray of 
the sea, or of the melting of the snow which falls 
