Identifier: manuponseaorhist00good (find matches)
Title: Man upon the sea : or, a history of maritime adventure, exploration, and discovery, from the earliest ages to the present time ...
Year: 1858 (1850s)
Authors: Goodrich, Frank B. (Frank Boott), 1826-1894
Subjects: Discoveries in geography Voyages and travels
Publisher: Philadelphia : J.B. Lippincott & co.
Contributing Library: Boston Public Library
Digitizing Sponsor: Boston Public Library

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en the effulgence in-creases, expands, and assumes a roseate hue. Strange and con-fused sounds are heard,—sounds like the flight of huge nightbirds as they flap their wings heavily over the plain. These arethe forerunners of one of those imposing phenomena whichstrike with awe all animated nature. An aurora borealis, thatmagnificent spectacle of the Polar regions, is at hand. Inthe horizon there appears a semicircle of dazzling brightness.From the centre of this glowing hemisphere radiate blazingcolumns and jets of light, rising to measureless heights andillumining heaven, earth, and sea. They glide along the snowsof the desert, empurpling the- blue tops of the ice-mountainsand tinging with a deepened red the tall black rocks of the twocontinents. Having thus reached the fulness of its splendor,the aurora grows gradually pale, and diffuses its effulgence in aluminous mist. At this moment, from the fantastic illusions ofthe mirage, frequent in those latitudes, the American coast, i #
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MAN UPON THE SEA. 373 though separated from that of Asia by the interposition of anarm of the sea, suddenly approaches so near it that a bridgemight be thrown from one world to the other. Did humanbeings inhabit those regions and breathe the pale-blue vaporswhich pervade them, they might almost converse across thenarrow inlet which serves to divide the continents. But nowthe aurora fades away, and the deceptive mirage sinks backinto the shadowy realms from whence it came. Fifty miles ofsullen waters roll again between the continents, and a threemonths night settles over the ghastly and appalling scene. It is not improbable that Behring passed to the north of EastCape, the promontory on the Asiatic side, into the ArcticOcean beyond. He was soon compelled to return, owing to thedisabled condition of his vessel, which was wrecked upon anisland on the 3d of November, 1741. This island, which waslittle better than a naked rock, afforded neither food nor shelter;and Behring, suffering from

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