These floating mountains of ice, to which Dutch navigators have given the name of Icebergs, and which are of all different magnitudes, are originally formed on land. The sun, even in those high latitudes, has a considerable power in melting the snow on the mountains, which, running down into the valleys, and again congealing, segments frequently break off from the entire mass, and fall into the sea. The ice of which these floating masses are composed, is of various colours. The original fresh water ice is sometimes incrusted with that formed from the sea water, and this again is covered with new ice formed of fallen snow. The different positions of the spectator relatively to the incidental rays of light, varies likewise the seeming hue of the whole. In some parts it emulates the vividness of the emerald, and in others, the most beautiful sapphire. When the iceberg is totally composed of melted snow, which is sometimes but partly the case, the refraction of the solar rays is the most beautiful; and the appearance of those floating mountains on the side opposite the sun, presents such a blaze of light, intermingled with different glowing tints, as totally to baffle description. “Frost,” says the eloquent Pennant, “sports with these icebergs, and gives them majestic as well as other singular forms. Masses have been seen, assuming the shape of a Gothic church with arched windows and doors, and all the rich drapery of that style, composed of what an _Arabian_ tale would scarcely dare to relate, of crystal of the richest sapphirine blue; tables with one or more feet; and often immense flat roofed temples, like those of _Luxor_ on the _Nile_, supported by round transparent columns of cerulean hue, float by the astonished spectator.” I have not unfrequently seen floating masses of ice which had evidently been formed of drifted snow, since they wanted the compactness and solidity of those formed by the melting of the snows. Many of these contained trees, and (as there are no trees in Spitzbergen) must have been originally formed in the northern parts of Russia or America, and, being carried by the rapid rivers of these countries into the ocean, had drifted into these latitudes. These trees have often the appearance of being burnt at the ends; and Olafsen mentions, that the violent friction which they frequently experience, occasionally sets them on fire, and exhibits the extraordinary phenomenon of flame and smoke issuing from this frozen ocean.--_Malte-Brun_, tome v. 241. Between one and two o’clock this morning, I was much entertained by the sun darting his rays through the cabin windows. 30th, Cast off from the iceberg, and endeavoured to force our way through the ice in a northern direction, till it became so thick and close around us, that we were forced to make fast to another large iceberg, where a small part of the surface of the water was free from ice.