FROM DANCOLAND TO ALEXANDER ISLANDS
At about eight o’clock in the evening of the twelfth we select what
seems to be a comfortable resting-place for the night. Owing to the
great depth of water we cannot anchor; hence, in accordance with our
previous habits, a little steam is kept up for an emergency movement,
and the _Belgica_ is allowed to drift with the winds and the
currents during the hours of rest. No one ever knew except the officers
on the watch how many narrow escapes we had in our silent hours of
slumber. Quietly but quickly the bark moves about, now in danger of
being thrown against an iceberg; now being propelled by some mysterious
force in a direct line for a rocky island, or the huge blue ice-wall of
the mainland. Danger and destruction are always within sight. They are
over the gunwale on every side. And then there is always the hazard of
submerged reefs upon which we might easily and unexpectedly ride to a
rapid end. Hair’s-breadth escapes have been on hand daily, until now we
have become hardened to the real dangers which are constantly before
us. But up to the present nothing has happened, and this freedom from
casualties is due to the persistent watchfulness, the painstaking care,
and the praiseworthy faithfulness of the officers and men on watch.
The night is of special interest to me. There is something about the
air, the water, the ice, and the land, which fixes my attention and
makes sleep impossible. There is a glitter in the sea, a sparkle on
the ice, and a stillness in the atmosphere, which fascinates the soul
but overpowers the mind. There is a solitude and restfulness about the
whole scene which can only be felt; it cannot be described. Here, to
the east, the face of the mysterious land is clothed by the successive
sheets of snows of the sleeping years of countless silent centuries.
About us are scores of icebergs, huge table-topped, pyramidal,
and castle-like masses, fragments of this same unknown blanket of
accumulated snows which clothes every aspect of antarctic land.
Out of the unfathomed blackness of the ocean to the west rise a series
of heavy mouse-coloured clouds, with their cargoes of vapour, which
sail over us in a regular train to deposit their snows on the unscaled
heights of the overland sea of ice eastward; under the stream of vapour
floating landward there is an occasional puff of icy wind rolling down
the stupendous white heights of Grahamland, which suddenly chills the
air about us and renders it incapable of suspending its charge of
humidity. As a result, there is either an occasional shower of snow or
a bank of fog which, for a time, veils the electric splendour of our
chilly fairyland.
Although the sky is cloudy and dull, and the sun is below the horizon,
there is a mystic light thrown against the masts and every projecting
object, which is, indeed, strangely puzzling. The sun is sliding
eastward under the southern sky, and over it, close to the horizon,
hangs a narrow band of lemon which remains from sunset to sunrise. This
zone of lemon is the only suggestion of colour in the heavens, and,
curiously enough, the light does not seem to come from the regions
over the sun but from the east. There is a haze over the land which
is luminous throughout the short night. The ice-blink, here, from the
snowy mountains far beyond the horizon, is reflected from slope to
slope and then into the land mist, giving it a curious glow which at
first seems inexplicable. This vapour changes in colour from sapphire
during the evening, to turquoise at midnight, and again to violet at
dawn. These hues, with their indescribable gradations, are spread over
the whites and blacks of the waters, and the snow and the rocks of the
land. It all seems like an artist’s dream.
[Illustration: Cape Eivind Astrup--Northern Point of Wiencke
Island.]
This morning, the thirteenth, opened with a brilliant rosy sunburst
over the icy alabaster walls of Grahamland: but this charm soon gave
way to a black mist which quickly suppressed the glory in which we
had rested during the few hours of midnight twilight. We are steaming
slowly westward, but the obscurity and the threatening character of
the weather prevents material progress. There is a light breeze from
the north-east, and a heavy swell from the north-west. The temperature
remains steadily at .08°C.(33.44°F.). We encounter small ice loosely
strewn in the waters in considerable quantities as we advance, but
owing to its diminutive size it does not offer any difficulties to our
progress. This ice differs greatly from any which I have seen floating
upon the sea either before or since. There is no ice of the same
character in the arctic. It is a form seen only along the outer edges
of the antarctic lands. There are three varieties of ice which are held
here close to the land by the huge swell of the South Pacific. The
kind in greatest abundance, giving the entire collection an appearance
different from all other packs of ice, is mostly from two to five feet
in diameter, with irregular glassy angles. It consists of fragments
of fresh-water ice from the glacial wall which everywhere fronts the
antarctic lands. Some, too, are the product of iceberg disruption.
Mixed with these hard, blue crystalline masses, are some spongy pieces
of salt-water ice, which are the product of pan-ice disruption.
Everywhere the white spires and table-tops of the colossal icebergs are
seen to rise over the restless icy water. At about three o’clock the
sun burst through the dark curtain of mist which hung over us, and the
dull, ice-strewn sea, which had been dreary and cheerless and full of
hidden dangers, became a most charming array of glittering brightness.
This is our first view of any considerable quantity of the sea-ice
of the antarctic, and as it rises and falls on the breast of the new
polar ocean it offers a dazzling glow, and a life which fill us with a
healthful enthusiasm. Steam is now quickly increased, the sails are
set, and the officers take their positions to push the _Belgica_
southward, farther into the unknown. The scientific men are scattered
about, some in the masts, some on the bridge, and others on the poop;
all looking anxiously for surprises in the new life and scenes about
us. Even the sailors cannot resist the temptation to stand still and
drink, with awe-inspiring amazement, the strange wine of action which
hangs over the mysterious whiteness of the new world of ice.
Although we feel that we are on the threshold of more great
discoveries, and although, for some unexplained reason, we are all in
a fever-heat of excitement, quite like a prize-fighter on the eve of
a great battle, calmly and coolly considered there is nothing very
wonderful in our immediate surroundings. The weather is quiet but
unsettled. A heavy sea rolls in under the pack-ice through which we
plough. To the west there is a black sky and under it, just on the
horizon, is the dark line of an open sea with the marbled peaks of
bergs silhouetted against the black sheen of the heavens. Far to the
eastward, about seventy miles off, is the rough outline of the great
white land which we have followed for the past three weeks. From the
crow’s-nest at the masthead we can see fifty miles of this strange
country. It begins in the north-east and fades away in the airy
distance of the south-west. Over the port-bow there is a fjordlike
break through the land which seems to extend eastward as far as our
eyes can reach. This may be another canal like Belgica Strait. If so,
its position corresponds fairly well with Bismark Strait, which was
vaguely seen by the German sealer, Dallman. The opening, however, of
this prospective strait is choked with heavy ice and, though we are
eager to push landward and examine the coast carefully, the drift-ice
forces us farther and farther away from the shore-line. In our
over-anxious efforts to keep the coast in sight we have pushed into an
area of ice which, for a time, shatters our new hopes.
[Illustration: Cape Renard, Dancoland.]
This area is covered by ice such as we have passed through all day.
As the sea rolls under, it seems a quivering mass of small fragments.
There is nothing about it to suggest its ensnaring powers. We steam
into a tongue which spreads out seaward. Over this there is a smoky sky
indicating that behind this ice, and immediately before us, there is an
open sea. Soon after we enter the ice, an on-shore wind and swell force
the fragments together and bring a number of icebergs against the pack
edge. We try with steam and sails to gain our release from the sudden
embrace, but our efforts will be of no avail until the wind changes and
the icy grip loosens. Our surroundings are wildly picturesque. To the
east of us are the high peaks and limitless glaciers of Grahamland.
The country is visible for only short periods and in patches, for a
high fog hangs constantly over the land, leaving only an opening here
and there. To the west the sky is fairly clear. A dark smoky zone near
the horizon indicates the limits of the ice and the open sea beyond.
Hundreds of icebergs are on the horizon. These are of a size and type
quite similar to those of the arctic sea. The entire mass--icebergs,
sea-ice, and the ship--rises and falls with the gigantic heave of
this South Pacific, and for a time it seems as though we are to be
carried with the moving drift against one of a number of small islands.
But a change in the direction of the wind promises to so separate the
ice that we shall soon be able to force our way out into the open sea
westward.
February 14.--We are again showered by a cold drizzling fog. We have
reached clear water and are pushing slowly southward. During the day
the fog rose occasionally, giving us a peep of the black peaks and
the snowy, glacial plains and slopes of Grahamland; but everywhere
the drift-ice is packed against the land in such a manner as to offer
no hope for a safe approach. Late in the day we came to a point where
the drift-ice suddenly terminated, and left the land accessible. The
officers and men worked hard all through last night, in their efforts
to extricate the bark, and everybody is now thoroughly exhausted. We
sought the land to find some sort of a haven where the vessel might
rest during the night, while the men try to gain a few hours’ sleep.
But our experiences in this venture were not such as to be conducive
to slumber; indeed, it proved one of the most anxious and restless
nights which had fallen to our lot while in this region. During the
early part of the evening we felt particularly pleased at the prospect
of a quiet night. Everything seems to promise this. The weather is
clearing; the temperature has fallen a degree or two; the sky exhibits
a bit of blue here and there; and even the ever stormy sea eases its
merciless pitches. The _Belgica_ glides along easily and restfully
as though she expected the needed period of rest, while the petrels
and gulls hover over us as if to pilot us to a safe retreat. At six
o’clock we are within a few miles of a chain of low islands. They
are small masses, mostly about a quarter of a mile in their greatest
diameter. Some are completely buried by a cap of ice sixty feet thick,
but others are bare. The rocks are mostly granite, smoothly polished
by the combined action of the sea and the ice. With our glasses we can
see small patches of green and brown moss in sheltered nooks; the snows
along the shore are tinged red from penguin habitation, and green with
sea algæ. Scattered all about these islands are a great number of large
icebergs. The chain of islands and the berg certainly offer us a safe
and promising shelter.
After steaming into a canal beyond which we expected to lay-to we found
ourselves suddenly and unexpectedly surrounded by white crests, under
which appeared a circle of submerged rocks. So complete was this hidden
circle of danger about us that we could not, for a long time, find a
spot where the distance between two rocks was sufficient to permit an
escape. We dropped a lead fifty fathoms, several times, but found no
bottom. A current rushed over the reefs and with our full force we
could barely make headway against it. In this position, with the swash
of the breaking waters coming to us out of the darkness, with the
penguins and the gulls screaming premonitions of danger, we struggled
against a current which seemed set to effect our destruction on one of
the reefs behind us. The firemen forced the steam, and the engineer
urged on the engines as he had never done before. Little by little we
gained on the force of the current and headed for an iceberg which was
about one hundred feet high. We argued that if there was sufficient
water to strand this berg it would be enough for us; but the passage
to the berg was not more than one hundred feet wide, and if there were
or were not dangerous shallows there we had no means of determining.
The sea was too heavy to send a boat in advance to make a sounding; and
because of the rocky and uneven character of the sea bottom, soundings
from on board gave us little warning. We must steam on and take our
chances.
These were anxious moments. We expected momentarily to feel a sudden
jar and a sudden arrest of our progress. We had had such an experience
twice before, and now expected a third. Amundsen was in the foremast;
Gerlache and Lecointe were on the bridge; Arctowski and I were on the
bowsprit. We were all looking for and expecting trouble, but we passed
beyond the angry crests of the reefs and out into deeper waters safely.
The sense of relief and rest which came over us at this time was indeed
a godsend.
[Illustration: Stratified Tabular Iceberg, off Cape Rasmussen, to
the lee of which the _Belgica_ rested during the night of
Feb. 12.]
[Illustration: Iceberg in Belgica Strait with a Great Tunnel
through it.]
Selecting a position in the lee of these islands, and close to a large
grounded iceberg, the bark was brought up to the wind and kept under
easy steam. It was difficult to keep from drifting onto the islands
or the bergs. At midnight the wind came down from the glacial
gullies and brushed the masts with hellish force, sending us pitching
and tossing over the disturbed sea in a manner which unbalanced the
equilibrium of the stomachs of even the oldest sailors. Now we rocked
within a few yards of the death-dealing wall of a berg, and again we
rolled uncomfortably near the phosphorescent breakers of a submerged
mountain. Material for our destruction was always close at hand, and we
went out often to see it. Sleep, rest, and quietude were far from us on
this memorable night of the fourteenth.
Early in the morning of the fifteenth we withdrew from our nightmare of
terrors and took to the more stormy and less dangerous waters westward.
There had been some snow, and rain, and sleet during the night. The
ropes were coated with ice, the masts incased in a glassy plating,
and the decks as slippery as ice could make them. The sea struck us
heavily under the starboard poop and spread a spray of water over the
quarter-deck. We took the wind from the north-east and set a course
south-south-west. The wind being free it became necessary to manipulate
the sails and hustle about on deck. With the vessel madly rocking,
the ropes incased in ice, and the floor glassy and glittering, the
difficulty of this work can be more easily imagined than written. In
one corner there a sailor on hands and knees was trying to keep from
being used as a baseball; in another, an officer was making the air
sulphureous because the ice on the ropes has cut his hand. Just then
the cook came along, and finding it more easy to stand on his head than
on his feet, the soup was spread over the ice as a lubricant; and then
some one uttered complaints in easy _Belgica_ language because
there would be no soup for his dinner. Altogether this was a day of
misery, and it was followed by many of a like nature.
Nearly everybody was seasick to-day; at least, everybody would be
if they admitted the truth. No one feels quite comfortable; we are
all inexpressibly tired and sleepy and uncomfortable at the pit of
the stomach, but nobody admits being a worshipper of Neptune. One is
bilious, another has eaten some “embalmed beef,” some have headaches,
others rheumatism. All the symptoms indicate ordinary seasickness, the
effects of the sudden throws upon the brisk, choppy sea. I have often
noticed this glum feeling come over an entire ship’s company after
being in ice or sheltered waters for any considerable time, as we have
been. We pride ourselves, however, as being weather-beaten sailors,
and having passed the nauseating storms of Cape Horn we are not going
to admit _mal de mer_, even if we did feed the fish several times
during the course of a meal.
[Illustration: One of the Wauwermans Islands.]
[Illustration: Sophie Rocks. Dancoland.]