The sound was unmistakable. The low murmur that comes from the shore is very different from the loud roar from the waves breaking on the iceberg in the deep sea, and the practised ear can quickly distinguish the one from the other. The headway of the ship was arrested as soon as possible, and the fog lifting a little, we could faintly see the fatal line of surf. But we had still twenty fathoms water under us, and had plenty of room to wheel round, and crawl back upon our old track until we were beyond soundings, when we returned to our old trade of groping for another day, at the end of which, to our great joy and relief, and with the sudden bound of a mouse popping from its dark hole, we slid from under the oppressive canopy of vapor into the bright sunshine. Indeed, the limit of the fog was almost like a wall—sharp and well-defined; and while the quarter-deck was still in shadow, the forecastle was brightly illuminated. Fearful now that the fog might roll over us again, the _Panther_ was made to do her best, and we steamed on into a scene of a very different description—still, however, among the icebergs—but now in a bright, instead of a cloudy atmosphere.
It was fortunate that the fog terminated when it did, for otherwise we would have been in great jeopardy. The icebergs were, in fact, so numerous, that the horizon was for a time quite obliterated. We turned and twisted among them to right and left, as one would follow the zig-zags of the Boston streets, from Brattle Square to—well, any other place you choose to mention.
We might have been in a state of constant terror had we not been in a state of constant admiration. The atmosphere from a wonderful fog changed to a wonderful brightness. I have rarely seen any thing to compare with it. The hour was approaching midnight, and the sun, nearing the north, gradually dipped until it had touched and finally passed close to the horizon, with its upper limb just above the line of waters. For some time previous the sky had been peculiarly brilliant; but when the sun went fairly down, the little clouds, which had before been tipped with crimson, melted away, and the whole sky became uniformly golden; while the sea, quite motionless, unruffled by even the slightest breath of air, reflected the gorgeous color like a mirror; and the icebergs, of every size, from the puny fragment a few fathoms only in diameter to the enormous block hundreds of feet in height, and of every shape, from the wall-sided semblance of a giant citadel to the spired effigy of a huge cathedral, presented an aspect of indescribable brilliancy as they floated there in the golden sea.