PRINCE WILLIAM SOUND 
71 
COLUMBIA GLACIER 
Between Yakutat Bay and Prince William Sound we 
made no landing, and our course lay too far from shore 
for observations of value on the glaciers. 
Prince William Sound is an extensive and intricate 
body of water, penetrating a mountain district. Its numer¬ 
ous islands and peninsulas are mountain peaks or ranges, 
and many of its inner arms and passages have the char¬ 
acter of glacial troughs or fiords. Among the mountains 
of the mainland at the east and west are many small gla¬ 
ciers, and a great mountain mass at the north supports 
extensive neves from which magnificent ice rivers flow to 
its northern arms. It was my good fortune to be landed at 
the mouth of one of these ice rivers and, in company 
with Palache, Coville, and Curtis, to spend several days in 
its study. Many photographs were made and some map¬ 
ping was done. 
In June, 1794? this glacier was seen from the mouth of 
the associated bay by Whidby, one of Vancouver’s officers. 
Vancouver says: u To the eastward of this is another 
bay of rather larger dimensions, with an island in its 
northeast corner, . . . terminated by a solid body of com¬ 
pact elevated ice, similar to that which has been before 
described . . . ; as they passed the eastern bay they 
again heard the thunder-like noise, and found that it had 
been produced by the falling of the large pieces of ice 
that appeared to have been very recently separated from 
the mass extending in vast abundance across the passage 
. . . , insomuch that it was with great difficulty the boats 
could effect a passage.” 1 
The bay and island appear on a map in Vancouver’s 
atlas (see fig. 42). The bay (without the island) is rep- 
1 A Voyage of Discovery to the Pacific Ocean and round the world, etc., Capt 
George Vancouver, vol. v, London, pp. 316-317, 1801. 
