through the dense snow-drift. All I
could distinguish, however, was the dim outline of distant mountains,
apparently covered with snow; but, as the day wore on, we came in sight
of the long low island of Anticosti, which, though considerably more
than a hundred miles in length, is not, in any part, more than fifteen
feet above the level of the water.

"Towards evening the land became much clearer to view; and now I could
perceive tall, peaked mountains some thousand feet in height, their
bases clad with stunted pine-trees--their white summits stretching away
into the clouds. As I looked, my astonishment was great, to find that
the vast gulf, which at day-break was some sixty miles in width, seemed
now diminished to about eight or ten, and continued to narrow rapidly,
as we proceeded on our course.

"The skipper, who had only made the voyage once before, seemed himself
confused, and endeavoured to explain our apparent vicinity to the land,
as some mere optical delusion--now, attributing it to something in the
refraction of the light; now, the snow: but although he spoke with all
the assurance of knowledge, it was evident to me, that he was by no
means satisfied in his own mind, of the facts he presented to ours.

"As the snow-storm abated, we could see that the mountains which lay on
either side of us, met each other in front, forming a vast amphitheatre
without any exit.

"This surely is not the Gulf of St. Lawrence?' said I to an old sailor
who sat leisurely chewing tobacco with his back to the capstern.

"'No, that it ain't,' said he coolly; 'it's Gaspe Bay, and I shouldn't
wish to be in a worse place.'

"What could have brought us here then? the skipper surely doesn't know
where we are?'

"I'll tell you what has brought us here. There's a current from the
Gulf stream sets in to this bay, at seven, or eight knots the hour, and
brings in all the floating ice along with it there, am I right? do you
hear that?'

"As he spoke, a tremendous crash, almost as loud as thunder, was heard
at our bow; and as I rushed to the bulwark and looked over, I beheld
vast fragments of ice more than a foot thick, encrusted with frozen
snow, flying past us in circling eddies; while further on, the large
flakes were mounting, one above the other, clattering, and crashing,
as the waves broke among them. Heaven knows how much farther our mulish
Cumberland skipper would have pursued his voyage of discovery, had
not the soundings proc