Adventure and adventurers > Hudson Bay, or, Everyday life in the wilds of North America

BREAKING-UP OF THE ICE.
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the sublimity of the spectacle that met our gaze can
scarcely be imagined. The noble river, here nearly two
miles broad, was entirely covered with huge blocks and
jagged lumps of ice, rolling and dashing against each
other in chaotic confusion, as the swelling floods heaved
them up and swept them with irresistible force towards
Hudson Bay. In one place, where the masses were
too closely packed to admit of violent collision, they
ground against each other with a slow but powerful
motion that curled their hard edges up like paper, till
the smaller lumps, unable to bear the pressure, were
ground to powder, and with a loud crash the rest hur¬
ried on to renew the struggle elsewhere, while the ice
above, whirling swiftly round in the clear space thus
formed, as if delighted at its sudden release, hurried
onwards. In another place, where it was not so closely
packed, a huge lump suddenly grounded on a shallow;
and in a moment the rolling masses, which were hurry¬
ing towards the sea with the velocity of a cataract, were
precipitated against it with a noise like thunder, and
the tremendous pressure from above forcing block upon
block with a loud hissing noise, raised, as if by magic,
an icy castle in the air, which, ere its pinnacles had
pointed for a second to the sky, fell with stunning vio¬
lence into the boiling flood from whence it rose. In a
short time afterwards the mouth of the river became so
full of ice that it stuck there, and in less than an hour
the water rose ten or fifteen feet, nearly to a level with
the top of the bank. In this state it continued for a
week; and then, about the end of May, the whole
floated quietly out to sea, and the cheerful river gurgled