Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England

THE WORLD OF ICE, BY R.M. BALLANTYNE.

CHAPTER ONE.

SOME OF THE dramatis personae INTRODUCED--RETROSPECTIVE GLANCES--CAUSES
OF FUTURE EFFECTS--OUR HERO'S EARLY LIFE AT SEA--A PIRATE--A TERRIBLE
FIGHT AND ITS CONSEQUENCES--BUZZBY'S HELM LASHED AMIDSHIPS--A WHALING
CRUISE BEGUN.

Nobody ever caught John Buzzby asleep by any chance whatever.  No weasel
was ever half so sensitive on that point as he was.  Wherever he
happened to be (and in the course of his adventurous life he had been to
nearly all parts of the known world) he was the first awake in the
morning and the last asleep at night; he always answered promptly to the
first call, and was never known by any man living to have been seen with
his eyes shut, except when he winked, and that operation he performed
less frequently than other men.

John Buzzby was an old salt--a regular true-blue jack tar of the old
school, who had been born and bred at sea; had visited foreign parts
innumerable; had weathered more storms than he could count, and had
witnessed more strange sights than he could remember.  He was tough, and
sturdy, and grizzled, and broad, and square, and massive--a first-rate
specimen of a John Bull, and, according to himself, "always kept his
weather-eye open."  This remark of his was apt to create confusion in
the minds of his hearers, for John meant the expression to be understood
figuratively, while, in point of fact, he almost always kept one of his
literal eyes open and the other partially closed, but as he reversed the
order of arrangement frequently, he might have been said to keep his
lee-eye as much open as the weather one.  This peculiarity gave to his
countenance an expression of earnest thoughtfulness mingled with humour.
Buzzby was fond of being thought old, and he looked much older than he
really was.  Men guessed his age at fifty-five, but they were ten years
out in their reckoning, for John had numbered only forty-five summers,
and was as tough and muscular as ever he had been--although not quite so
elastic.

John Buzzby stood on the pier of the seaport town of Grayton watching
the active operations of the crew of a whaling ship which was on the
point of starting for the icebound seas of the frozen regions, and
making sundry remarks to a stout, fair-haired boy of fifteen, who stood
by his side gazing at the ship with an expression of deep sadness.

"She's a trim-built craft and a good sea-boat, I'll be bound, Master
Fred," observed the sailor, "but she's too small by half, accordin' to
my notions, and I _have_ seen a few whalers in my day.  Them
bow-timbers, too, are scarce thick enough for goin' bump agin the ice o'
Davis Straits.  Howsome'iver, I've seen worse craft drivin' a good trade
in the Polar Seas."

"She's a first-rate craft in all respects, and you have too high an
opinion of your own judgment," replied the youth indignantly.  "Do you
suppose that my father, who is an older man than yourself, and as good a
sailor, would buy a ship, and fit her out, and go off to the
whale-fishery in her if he did not think her a good one?"

"Ah!  Master Fred, you're a chip of the old block--neck or nothing--
carry on all sail till you tear the masts out of her!  Reef the
t'gallant sails of your temper, boy, and don't run foul of an old man
who has been all but a wet-nurse to ye--taught ye to walk, and swim, and
pull an oar, and build ships, and has hauled ye out o' the sea when ye
fell in--from the time ye could barely stump along on two legs, lookin'
like as if ye was more nor half seas over."

"Well, Buzzby," replied the boy, laughing, "if you've been all that to
me, I think you _have_ been a wet-nurse too!  But why do you run down my
father's ship?  Do you think I'm going to stand that?  No, not even from
you, old boy."

"Hallo! youngster," shouted a voice from the deck of the vessel in
question, "run up and tell your father we're all ready, and if he don't
make haste he'll lose the tide, so he will, and that'll make us have to
start on a Friday, it will, an' that'll not do for me no how, it won't;
so make sail and look sharp about it, do--won't you?"

"What a tongue he's got," remarked Buzzby.  "Before I'd go to sea with a
first mate who jawed like that I'd be a landsman.  Don't ever you git to
talk too much, Master Fred, wotever ye do.  My maxim is--and it has
served me through life, uncommon,--`Keep your weather-eye open and your
tongue housed 'xcept when you've got occasion to use it.'  If that
fellow'd use his eyes more and his tongue less he'd see your father
comin' down the road there, right before the wind; with his old sister
in tow."

"How I wish he would have let me go with him!" muttered Fred to himself
sorrowfully.

"No chance now, I'm a-feared," remarked his companion.  "The gov'nor's
as stiff as a nor'wester.  Nothin' in the world can turn him once he's
made up his mind, but a regular sou'easter.  Now, if you had been _my_
son, and yonder tight craft _my_ ship, I would have said, come, at once.
But your father knows best, lad, and you're a wise son to obey orders
cheerfully, without question.  That's another o' my maxims: `Obey orders
an' ax no questions.'"

Frederick Ellice, senior, who now approached, whispering words of
consolation into the ear of his weeping sister, might, perhaps, have
just numbered fifty years.  He was a fine, big, bold, hearty Englishman,
with a bald head, grizzled locks, a loud but not harsh voice, a rather
quick temper, and a kind, earnest, enthusiastic heart.  Like Buzzby, he
had spent nearly all his life at sea, and had become so thoroughly
accustomed to walking on an unstable foundation, that he felt quite
uncomfortable on solid ground, and never remained more than a few months
at a time on shore.  He was a man of good education and gentlemanly
manners, and had worked his way up in the merchant service, step by
step, until he obtained the command of a West India trader.

A few years previous to the period in which our tale opens, an event
occurred which altered the course of Captain Ellice's life, and for a
long period plunged him into the deepest affliction.  This was the loss
of his wife at sea, under peculiarly distressing circumstances.

At the age of thirty Captain Ellice had married a pretty blue-eyed girl,
who resolutely refused to become a sailor's bride, unless she should be
permitted to accompany her husband to sea.  This was without much
difficulty agreed to, and forthwith Alice Bremner became Mrs Ellice,
and went to sea.  It was during her third voyage to the West Indies that
our hero, Fred, was born, and it was during this, and succeeding
voyages, that Buzzby became "all but a wet-nurse" to him.

Mrs Ellice was a loving, gentle, seriously-minded woman.  She devoted
herself, heart and soul, to the training of her boy, and spent many a
pleasant hour in that little unsteady cabin, in endeavouring to instil
into his infant mind the blessed truths of Christianity, and in making
the name of Jesus familiar to his ear.  As Fred grew older, his mother
encouraged him to hold occasional intercourse with the sailors, for her
husband's example taught her the value of a bold, manly spirit, and she
knew that it was impossible for her to instil _that_ into him, but she
was careful to guard him from the evil that he might chance to learn
from the men, by committing him to the tender care of Buzzby.  To do the
men justice, however, this was almost unnecessary, for they felt that a
mother's watchful eye was on the child, and no unguarded word fell from
their lips while he was romping about the forecastle.

When it was time for Fred to go to school, Mrs Ellice gave up her
roving life, and settled in her native town of Grayton, where she
resided with her widowed sister, Amelia Bright, and her niece Isobel.
Here Fred received the rudiments of an excellent education at a private
academy.  At the age of twelve, however, Master Fred became restive,
and, during one of his father's periodical visits home, begged to be
taken to sea.  Captain Ellice agreed; Mrs Ellice insisted on
accompanying them, and in a few weeks they were once again on their old
home, the ocean, and Fred was enjoying his native air in company with
his friend Buzzby, who stuck to the old ship like one of her own stout
timbers.

But this was destined to be a disastrous voyage.  One evening, after
crossing the line, they descried a suspicious-looking schooner to
windward, bearing down upon them under a cloud of canvas.

"What do you think of her, Buzzby?" enquired Captain Ellice, handing his
glass to the seaman.

Buzzby gazed in silence and with compressed lips for some time; then he
returned the glass, at the same time muttering the word: "Pirate."

"I thought so," said the captain in a deep, unsteady voice.  "There is
but one course for us, Buzzby," he continued, glancing towards his wife,
who, all unconscious of their danger, sat near the taffrail, employed
with her needle; "these fellows show no mercy, because they expect none,
either from God or man.  We must fight to the last.  Go, prepare the men
and get out the arms.  I'll tell my wife."

Buzzby went forward, but the captain's heart failed him, and he took two
or three rapid, hesitating turns on the quarter-deck ere he could make
up his mind to speak.

"Alice," he said at length abruptly, "yonder vessel is a pirate."

Mrs Ellice looked up in surprise, and her face grew pale as her eye met
the troubled gaze of her husband.

"Are you quite sure, Frederick?"

"Yes, quite.  Would God that I were left alone to--but--nay, do not be
alarmed; perhaps I am wrong; it may be a--a clipper-built trading
vessel.  If not, Alice, we must make some show of fighting, and try to
frighten them.  Meanwhile you must go below."

The captain spoke encouragingly as he led his wife to the cabin, but his
candid countenance spoke too truthfully, and she felt that his look of
anxious concern bade her fear the worst.

Pressing her fervently to his heart, Captain Ellice sprang on deck.

By this time the news had spread through the ship, and the crew,
consisting of upwards of thirty men, were conversing earnestly in knots
of four or five while they sharpened and buckled on cutlasses, or loaded
pistols and carbines.

"Send the men aft, Mr Thompson," said the captain, as he paced the deck
to and fro, casting his eyes occasionally on the schooner, which was
rapidly nearing the vessel.  "Take another pull at these
main-topsail-halyards, and send the steward down below for my sword and
pistols.  Let the men look sharp; we've no time to lose, and hot work is
before us."

"I will go for your sword, Father," cried Fred, who had just come on
deck.

"Boy, boy, you must go below; you can be of no use here."

"But, Father, you know that I'm not _afraid_."

"I know that, boy; I know it well; but you're too young to fight; you're
not strong enough; besides, you must comfort and cheer your mother, she
may want you."

"I am old enough and strong enough to load and fire a pistol, Father;
and I heard one of the men say we would need all the hands on board, and
more if we had them; besides, it was my mother who told me what was
going on, and sent me on deck to _help you to fight_."

A momentary gleam of pride lit up the countenance of the captain as he
said hastily: "You may stay, then," and turned towards the men, who now
stood assembled on the quarterdeck.

Addressing the crew in his own blunt, vigorous style, he said: "Lads,
yon rascally schooner is a pirate, as you all know well enough.  I need
not ask you if you are ready to fight--I see by your looks you are.  But
that's not enough--you must make up your minds to fight _well_.  You
know that pirates give no quarter.  I see the decks are swarming with
men.  If you don't go at them like bull-dogs you'll walk the plank
before sunset, every man of you.  Now, go forward, and double-shot your
muskets and pistols, and stick as many of the latter into your belts as
they will hold.  Mr Thompson, let the gunner double-shot the four big
guns, and load the little carronade with musket balls to the muzzle.  If
they do try to board us, they'll get a warm reception."

"There goes a shot, sir," said Buzzby, pointing towards the piratical
schooner, from the side of which a white cloud burst and a round shot
ricochetted over the sea, passing close ahead of the ship.

"Ay, that's a request for us to lay-to," said the captain bitterly, "but
we won't.  Keep her away a point."

"Ay, ay, sir," sung out the man at the wheel.  A second and third shot
were fired, but passed unheeded, and the captain, fully expecting that
the next would be fired into them, ordered the men below.

"We can't afford to lose a man, Mr Thompson; send them all down."

"Please, sir, may I remain?" said Buzzby, touching his hat.

"Obey orders," answered the captain sternly.  The sailor went below with
a sulky fling.

For nearly an hour the two vessels cut through the water before a steady
breeze, during which time the fast-sailing schooner gradually overhauled
the heavy West-Indiaman, until she approached within speaking distance.
Still Captain Ellice paid no attention to her, but stood with compressed
lips beside the man at the wheel, gazing alternately at the sails of his
vessel, and at the windward horizon, where he fancied he saw indications
that led him to hope the breeze would fail ere long.

As the schooner drew nearer, a man leaped on the hammock-nettings, and,
putting a trumpet to his mouth, sang out lustily: "Ship ahoy, where are
you from and what's your cargo?"

Captain Ellice made no reply, but ordered four of his men on deck to
point one of the stern-chasers.

Again the voice came harshly across the waves, as if in passion: "Heave
to, or I'll sink you."  At the same moment the black flag was run up to
the peak, and a shot passed between the main and fore-mast.

"Stand by to point this gun," said the captain in a subdued voice.

"Ay, ay, sir!"

"Fetch a red-hot iron; luff, luff a little--a little more--steady, so."
At the last word there was a puff and a roar, and an iron messenger flew
towards the schooner.  The gun had been fired more as a reply of
defiance to the pirate, than with the hope of doing him any damage, but
the shot had been well aimed--it cut the schooner's main-sail-yard in
two, and brought it rattling down on deck.  Instantly the pirate yawed
and delivered a broadside, but in the confusion on deck the guns were
badly aimed, and none took effect.  The time lost in this manoeuvre,
added to the crippled condition of the schooner, enabled the
West-Indiaman to gain considerably on her antagonist, but the pirate
kept up a well-directed fire with his bow-chasers, and many of the shots
struck the hull, and cut the rigging seriously.  As the sun descended
towards the horizon the wind fell gradually, and ceased at length
altogether, so that both vessels lay rolling on the swell with their
sails flapping idly against the masts.

"They're a gittin' out the boats, sir," remarked John Buzzby, who,
unable to restrain himself any longer, had crept upon deck at the risk
of another reprimand; "and, if my eyes be'nt deceiving me, there's a
sail on the horizon to wind'ard--leastways, the direction which _wos_
wind'ard afore it fell calm."

"She's bringing a breeze along with her," remarked the captain, "but I
fear the boats will come up before it reaches us.  There are three in
the water, and manned already.  There they come.  Now, then, call up all
hands."

In a few seconds the crew of the West-Indiaman were at their stations,
ready for action, and Captain Ellice, with Fred at his elbow, stood
beside one of the stern-chasers.  Meanwhile, the boats of the pirate--
five in number--pulled away in different directions, evidently with the
intention of attacking the ship at different points.  They were full of
men armed to the teeth.  While they rowed towards the ship the schooner
resumed its fire, and one ball cut away the spanker boom, and slightly
wounded two of the men with splinters.  The guns of the ship were now
brought to bear on the boats, but without effect, although the shot
plunged into the water all round them.  As they drew nearer, a brisk
fire of musketry was opened on them, and the occasional falling of an
oar and confusion on board showed that the shots told.  The pirates
replied vigorously, but without effect, as the men of the ship were
sheltered by the bulwarks.

"Pass the word to load and reserve fire," said the captain, "and hand me
a musket, Fred.  Load again as fast as I fire."  So saying, the captain
took aim, and fired at the steersman of the largest boat, which pulled
towards the stern.  "Another, Fred--"

At this moment a withering volley was poured upon the boat, and a savage
yell of agony followed, while the rowers--who remained unhurt--paused
for an instant as if paralysed.  Next instant they recovered, and
another stroke would have brought them almost alongside, when Captain
Ellice pointed the little carronade and fired.  There was a terrific
crash, the gun recoiled violently to the other side of the deck, and the
pirate boat sank, leaving the sea covered with dead and wounded men.  A
number, however, who seemed to bear charmed lives, seized their
cutlasses with their teeth, and swam boldly for the ship.  This
incident, unfortunately, attracted too much of the attention of the
crew, and, ere they could prevent it, another boat reached the bow of
the ship, the crew of which sprang up the side like cats, formed on the
forecastle, and poured a volley upon the men.

"Follow me, lads," shouted the captain, as he sprang forward like a
tiger.  The first man he reached fell by a ball from his pistol; in
another moment the opposing parties met in a hand-to-hand conflict.
Meanwhile Fred, having been deeply impressed with the effect of the shot
from the little carronade, succeeded in raising and reloading it.  He
had scarcely accomplished this when one of the boats reached the
larboard quarter, and two of the men sprang up the side.  Fred observed
them, and felled the first with a handspike before he reached the deck,
but the pirate who instantly followed, would have killed him, had he not
been observed by the second mate, who had prevented several of the men
from joining in the melee on the forecastle, in order to meet such an
emergency as this.  Rushing to the rescue with his party, he drove the
pirates back into the boat, which was immediately pulled towards the
bow, where the other two boats were now grappling and discharging their
crews on the forecastle.  Although the men of the West-Indiaman fought
with desperate courage, they could not stand before the increasing
numbers of pirates, who now crowded the forepart of the ship in a dense
mass.  Gradually they were beaten back, and at length were brought to
bay on the quarter-deck.

"Help, Father!" cried Fred, pushing through the struggling crowd,
"here's the carronade ready loaded."

"Ha! boy, well done!" cried the captain, seizing the gun, and, with the
help of Buzzby, who never left his side, dragging it forward.  "Clear
the way, lads!"

In a moment the little cannon was pointed to the centre of the mass of
men, and fired.  One awful shriek of agony rose above the din of the
fight, as a wide gap was cut through the crowd; but this only seemed to
render the survivors more furious.  With a savage yell they charged the
quarter-deck, but were hurled back again and again by the captain, and a
few chosen men who stood around him.  At length one of the pirates, who
had been all along conspicuous for his strength and daring, stepped
deliberately up, and, pointing a pistol at the captain's breast, fired.
Captain Ellice fell, and at the same moment a ball laid the pirate low;
another charge was made; Fred rushed forward to protect his father, but
was thrown down and trodden under foot in the rush, and in two minutes
more the ship was in possession of the pirates.

Being filled with rage at the opposition they had met with, these
villains proceeded, as they said, to make short work of the crew, while
several of them sprang into the cabin, where they discovered Mrs Ellice
almost dead with terror.  Dragging her violently on deck, they were
about to cast her into the sea, when Buzzby, who stood with his hands
bound, suddenly burst his bonds and sprang towards her.  A blow from the
butt of a pistol, however, stretched him insensible on the deck.

"Where is my husband?--my boy?" screamed Mrs Ellice wildly.

"They've gone before you, or they'll soon follow," said a savage
fiercely, as he raised her in his powerful arms, and hurled her
overboard.  A loud shriek was followed by a heavy plunge.  At the same
moment two of the men raised the captain, intending to throw him
overboard also, when a loud boom arrested their attention, and a
cannon-shot ploughed up the sea close in front of their bows.

While the fight was raging, no one had observed the fact that the breeze
had freshened, and a large man-of-war, with American colours at her
peak, was now within gunshot of the ship.  No sooner did the pirates
make this discovery than they rushed to their boats, with the intention
of pulling to their schooner, but those who had been left in charge,
seeing the approach of the man-of-war, and feeling that there was no
chance of escape for their comrades, or, as is more than probable, being
utterly indifferent about them, crowded all sail, and slipped away, and
it was now hull-down on the horizon to leeward.  The men in the boats
rowed after her with the energy of despair, but the Americans gave
chase, and we need scarcely add that, in a very short time, all were
captured.

When the man-of-war rejoined the West-Indiaman, the night had set in and
a stiff breeze had arisen, so that the long and laborious search that
was made for the body of poor Mrs Ellice, proved utterly fruitless.
Captain Ellice, whose wound was very severe, was struck down as if by a
thunderbolt, and for a long time his life was despaired of.  During his
illness Fred nursed him with the utmost tenderness, and, in seeking to
comfort his father, found some relief to his own stricken heart.

Months passed away.  Captain Ellice was conveyed to the residence of his
sister in Grayton, and, under her care, and the nursing of his little
niece, Isobel, he recovered his wonted health and strength.  To the eyes
of men, Captain Ellice and his son were themselves again, but those who
judge of men's hearts by their outward appearance and expressions, in
nine cases out of ten judge very wide of the mark indeed.  Both had
undergone a great change.  The brilliancy and glitter of this world had
been completely and rudely dispelled, and both had been led to enquire
whether there was not something better to live for than mere present
advantage and happiness; something that would stand by them in those
hours of sickness and sorrow which must inevitably, sooner or later,
come upon all men.

But Captain Ellice could not be induced to resume the command of his old
ship, or voyage again to the West Indies.  He determined to change the
scene of his future labours and sail to the frozen seas, where the
aspect of every object--even the ocean itself--would be very unlikely to
recall the circumstances of his loss.

Some time after his recovery, Captain Ellice purchased a brig, and
fitted her out as a whaler, determined to try his fortune in the
northern seas.  Fred pleaded hard to be taken out, but his father felt
that he had more need to go to school than to sea; so he refused, and
Fred, after sighing very deeply once or twice, gave in with a good
grace.  Buzzby, too, who stuck to his old commander like a leech, was
equally anxious to go, but Buzzby, in a sudden and unaccountable fit of
tenderness, had, just two months before, married a wife, who might be
appropriately described as "fat, fair, and forty," and Buzzby's wife
absolutely forbade him to go.  Alas!  Buzzby was no longer his own
master.  At the age of forty-five he became--as he himself expressed
it--an abject slave, and he would as soon have tried to steer in a
slipper bath, right in the teeth of an equinoctial hurricane, as have
opposed the will of his wife.  He used to sigh gruffly when spoken to on
this subject, and compare himself to a Dutch galliot that made more
lee-way than head-way, even with a wind on the quarter.  "Once," he
would remark, "I was clipper-built and could sail right in the wind's
eye, but ever since I tuck this craft in tow I've gone to leeward like a
tub.  In fact, I find there's only one way of going ahead with my Poll,
and that is right before the wind!  I used to yaw about a good deal at
first, but she tuck that out o' me in a day or two.  If I put the helm
only so much as one stroke to starboard, she guv' a tug at the tow-rope
that brought the wind dead aft again; so I've gi'n it up, and lashed the
tiller right amidships."

So Buzzby did not accompany his old commander; he did not even so much
as suggest the possibility of it, but he shook his head with great
solemnity as he stood with Fred, and Mrs Bright, and Isobel, at the end
of the pier, gazing at the brig, with one eye very much screwed up, and
a wistful expression in the other, while the graceful craft spread out
her canvas and bent over to the breeze.

CHAPTER TWO.

DEPARTURE OF THE POLE STAR FOR THE FROZEN SEAS--SAGE REFLECTIONS OF MRS.
BRIGHT, AND SAGACIOUS REMARKS OF BUZZBY--ANXIETIES, FEARS, SURMISES, AND
RESOLUTIONS--ISOBEL--A SEARCH PROPOSED--DEPARTURE OF THE DOLPHIN FOR THE
FAR NORTH.

Digressions are bad at the best, and we feel some regret that we should
have been compelled to begin our book with one; but they are necessary
evils, sometimes, so we must ask our reader's forgiveness, and beg him,
or her, to remember that we are still at the commencement of our story,
standing at the end of the pier, and watching the departure of the _Pole
Star_ whale-ship, which is now a scarcely distinguishable speck on the
horizon.

As it disappeared Buzzby gave a grunt, Fred and Isobel uttered a sigh in
unison, and Mrs Bright resumed the fit of weeping which for some time
she had unconsciously suspended.

"I fear we shall never see him again," sobbed Mrs Bright, as she took
Isobel by the hand and sauntered slowly home, accompanied by Fred and
Buzzby, the latter of whom seemed to regard himself in the light of a
shaggy Newfoundland or mastiff, who had been left to protect the family.
"We are always hearing of whale-ships being lost, and, somehow or
other, we _never_ hear of the crews being saved, as one reads of when
ships are wrecked in the usual way on the sea-shore."

Isobel squeezed her mother's hand, and looked up in her face with an
expression that said plainly: "Don't cry so, Mamma, I'm _sure_ he will
come back," but she could not find words to express herself, so she
glanced towards the mastiff for help.

Buzzby felt that it devolved upon him to afford consolation under the
circumstances, but Mrs Bright's mind was of that peculiar stamp which
repels advances in the way of consolation unconsciously, and Buzzby was
puzzled.  He screwed up first the right eye and then the left, and smote
his thigh repeatedly; and assuredly, if contorting his visage could have
comforted Mrs Bright, she would have returned home a happy woman, for
he made faces at her violently for full five minutes; but it did her no
good, perhaps because she didn't see him, her eyes being suffused with
tears.

"Ah! yes," resumed Mrs Bright, with another burst, "I _know_ they will
never come back, and your silence shows that you think so too; and to
think of their taking two years' provisions with them _in case of
accidents_!--doesn't that prove that there are _going_ to be accidents?
and didn't I hear one of the sailors say that she was a crack ship, a
number one?  I don't know what he meant by a number one; but if she's a
cracked ship I _know_ she will never come back; and although I told my
dear brother of it, and advised him not to go, he only laughed at me,
which was very unkind, I'm sure--"

Here Mrs Bright's feelings overcame her again.

"Why, Aunt," said Fred, scarce able to restrain a laugh, despite the
sadness that lay at his heart, "when the sailor said it was a crack
ship, he meant that it was a _good_ one, a first-rate one."

"Then why did he not say what he meant?  But you are talking nonsense,
boy; do you think that I will believe a man means to say a thing is good
when he calls it cracked? and I'm sure nobody would say a cracked
tea-pot was as good as a whole one; but tell me, Buzzby, do you think
they ever _will_ come back?"

"Why, ma'am, in coorse I do," replied Buzzby vehemently; "for why? if
they don't, they're the first that ever went out o' this port in my day
as didn't.  They've a good ship and lots o' grub, and it's like to be a
good season; and Captain Ellice has, for the most part, good luck; and
they've started with a fair wind, and kep' clear of a Friday, and what
more could ye wish?  I only wish as I was aboard along with them, that's
all."

Buzzby delivered himself of this oration with the left eye shut and
screwed up, and the right one open.  Having concluded, he shut and
screwed up the right eye, and opened the left--he reversed the engine,
so to speak, as if he wished to back out from the scene of his triumph,
and leave the course clear for others to speak.  But his words were
thrown away on Mrs Bright, who was emphatically a weak-minded woman,
and never exercised her reason at all, except in a spasmodic, galvanic
sort of way, when she sought to defend or to advocate some unreasonable
conclusion of some sort, at which her own weak mind had arrived somehow.
So she shook her head, and sobbed good-bye to Buzzby, as she ascended
the sloping avenue that led to her pretty cottage, on the green hill
that overlooked the harbour and the sea beyond.

As for John Buzzby, having been absent from home full half an hour
beyond his usual dinner-hour, he felt that, for a man who had lashed his
helm amidships, he was yawing alarmingly out of his course, so he spread
all the canvas he could carry, and steered, right before the wind,
towards the village, where, in a little, whitewashed, low-roofed,
one-doored and two-little-windowed cottage, his spouse (and dinner)
awaited him.

To make a long story short, three years passed away, but the _Pole Star_
did not return, and no news of her could be got from the various
whale-ships that visited the port of Grayton.  Towards the end of the
second year Buzzby began to shake his head despondingly; and as the
third drew to a close, the expression of gloom never left his honest,
weather-beaten face.  Mrs Bright too, whose anxiety at first was only
half genuine, now became seriously alarmed, and the fate of the missing
brig began to be the talk of the neighbourhood.  Meanwhile Fred Ellice
and Isobel grew and improved in mind and body, but anxiety as to his
father's fate rendered the former quite unable to pursue his studies,
and he determined at last to procure a passage in a whale-ship, and go
out in search of the brig.

It happened that the principal merchant and ship-owner in the town, Mr
Singleton by name, was an intimate friend and old school-fellow of
Captain Ellice, so Fred went boldly to him and proposed that a vessel
should be fitted out immediately, and sent off to search for his
father's brig.  Mr Singleton smiled at the request, and pointed out the
utter impossibility of his agreeing to it; but he revived Fred's sinking
hopes by saying that, he was about to send out a whaler to the northern
seas at any rate, and that he would give orders to the captain to devote
a _portion_ of his time to the search, and, moreover, agreed to let Fred
go as a passenger in company with his own son Tom.

Now Tom Singleton had been Fred's bosom friend and companion during his
first year at school, but during the last two years he had been sent to
the Edinburgh University, to prosecute his medical studies, and the two
friends had only met at rare intervals.  It was with unbounded delight,
therefore, that he found his old companion, now a youth of twenty, was
to go out as surgeon of the ship, and he could scarce contain himself,
as he ran down to Buzzby's cottage to tell him the good news, and ask
him to join.

Of course Buzzby was ready to go, and, what was of far greater
importance in the matter, his wife threw no obstacle in the way.  On the
contrary, she undid the lashings of the helm with her own hand, and told
her wondering partner, with a good-humoured (but firm) smile, to steer
where he chose, and she would content herself with the society of the
two young Buzzbys (both miniature facsimiles of their father), till he
came back.

Once again a whale-ship prepared to sail from the port of Grayton, and
once again Mrs Bright and Isobel stood on the pier to see her depart.
Isobel was about thirteen now, and as pretty a girl, according to
Buzzby, as you could meet with in any part of Britain.  Her eyes were
blue, and her hair nut-brown, and her charms of face and figure were
enhanced immeasurably by an air of modesty and earnestness that went
straight home to your heart, and caused you to adore her at once.
Buzzby doated on her as if she were his only child, and felt a secret
pride in being in some undefinable way her protector.  Buzzby
philosophised about her, too, after a strange fashion.  "You see," he
would say to Fred, "it's not that her figure-head is cut altogether
after a parfect pattern; by no means, for I've seen pictur's and statues
that wos better; but she carries her head a little down, d'ye see,
Master Fred, and there's where it is; that's the way I gauges the worth
o' young women, jist accordin' as they carry their chins up or down.  If
their brows come well for'ard, and they seems to be lookin' at the
ground they walk on, I knows their brains is firm stuff, and in good
workin' order; but when I sees them carryin' their noses high out o' the
water, as if they wos afeard o' catchin' sight o' their own feet, and
their chins elewated so that a little boy standin' in front o' them
couldn't see their faces nohow, I make pretty sure that t'other end is
filled with a sort o' _mush_ that's fit only to think o' dress and
dancing."

On the present occasion Isobel's eyes were red and swollen, and by no
means improved by weeping.  Mrs Bright, too, although three years had
done little to alter her character, seemed to be less demonstrative, and
much more sincere than usual, in her grief at parting from Fred.

In a few minutes all was ready.  Young Singleton and Buzzby having
hastily but earnestly bade Mrs Bright and her daughter farewell, leaped
on board.  Fred lingered for a moment.

"Once more, dear Aunt," said he, "farewell!  With God's blessing we
shall come back soon.  Write to me, darling Isobel, won't you? to
Uppernavik, on the coast of Greenland.  If none of our ships are bound
in that direction, write by way of Denmark.  Old Mr Singleton will tell
you how to address your letter, and see that it be a long one."

"Now, then, youngster, jump aboard," shouted the captain; "look sharp!"

"Ay, ay," returned Fred, and in another moment he was on the
quarter-deck, by the side of his friend Tom.

The ship, loosed from her moorings, spread her canvas, and plunged
forward on her adventurous voyage.

But this time she does not grow smaller as she advances before the
freshening breeze, for you and I, reader, have embarked in her, and the
land now fades in the distance, until it sinks from view on the distant
horizon, while nothing meets our gaze, but the vault of the bright blue
sky above, and the plain of the dark blue sea below.

CHAPTER THREE.

THE VOYAGE--THE DOLPHIN AND HER CREW--ICE AHEAD--POLAR SCENES--MASTHEAD
OBSERVATIONS--THE FIRST WHALE--GREAT EXCITEMENT.

And now we have fairly got into blue water--the sailor's delight, the
landsman's dread--

  "The sea! the sea! the open sea;
  The blue, the fresh, the ever free."

"It's my opinion," remarked Buzzby to Singleton one day, as they stood
at the weather gangway, watching the foam that spread from the vessel's
bow as she breasted the waves of the Atlantic gallantly,--"It's my
opinion that our skipper is made o' the right stuff.  He's entered quite
into the spirit of the thing, and I hear'd him say to the first mate
yesterday, he'd made up his mind to run right up into Baffin's Bay, and
make enquiries for Captain Ellice first, before goin' to his usual
whalin'-ground.  Now that's wot I call doin' the right thing; for, ye
see, he runs no small risk o' gettin' beset in the ice, and losing the
fishin' season altogether by so doin'."

"He's a fine fellow," said Singleton; "I like him better every day, and
I feel convinced he will do his utmost to discover the whereabouts of
our missing friend; but I fear much that our chances are small, for
although we know the spot which Captain Ellice intended to visit, we
cannot tell to what part of the frozen ocean, ice and currents may have
carried him."

"True," replied Buzzby, giving to his left eye and cheek just that
peculiar amount of screw which indicated intense sagacity and
penetration; "but I've a notion that, if they are to be found, Captain
Guy is the man to find 'em."

"I hope it may turn out as you say.  Have you ever been in these seas
before, Buzzby?"

"No, sir--never; but I've got a half-brother wot has bin in the
Greenland whale-fishery, and I've bin in the south-sea line myself."

"What line was that, Buzzby?" enquired David Summers, a sturdy boy of
about fifteen, who acted as assistant steward, and was, in fact, a
nautical maid-of-all-work.  "Was it a log-line, or a bow-line, or a
cod-line, or a bit of the equator?--eh!"

The old salt deigned no reply to this passing sally, but continued his
converse with Singleton.

"I could give ye many a long yarn about the South Seas," said Buzzby,
gazing abstractedly down into the deep.  "One time, when I was about
fifty mile to the sou'west o' Cape Horn, I--"

"Dinner's ready, sir," said a thin, tall, active man, stepping smartly
up to Singleton, and touching his cap.

"We must talk over that some other time, Buzzby.  The captain loves
punctuality."  So saying, the young surgeon sprang down the companion
ladder, leaving the old salt to smoke his pipe in solitude.

And here we may pause a few seconds to describe our ship and her crew.

The _Dolphin_ was a tight, new, barque-rigged vessel of about three
hundred tons burden, built expressly for the northern whale-fishery, and
carried a crew of forty-five men.  Ships that have to battle with the
ice require to be much more powerfully built, than those that sail in
unencumbered seas.  The _Dolphin_ united strength with capacity and
buoyancy.  The under part of her hull and sides were strengthened with
double timbers, and fortified externally with plates of iron; while,
internally, stanchions and cross-beams were so arranged as to cause
pressure on any part to be supported by the whole structure; and on her
bows, where shocks from the ice might be expected to be most frequent
and severe, extra planking, of immense strength and thickness, was
secured.  In other respects the vessel was fitted up much in the same
manner as ordinary merchantmen.  The only other peculiarity about her,
worthy of notice, was the crow's-nest, a sort of barrel-shaped structure
fastened to the fore-masthead, in which, when at the whaling-ground, a
man is stationed to look out for whales.  The chief men in the ship were
Captain Guy, a vigorous, practical American; Mr Bolton, the first mate,
an earnest, stout, burly, off-hand Englishman; and Mr Saunders, the
second mate, a sedate, broad-shouldered, raw-boned Scot, whose opinion
of himself was unbounded, whose power of argument was extraordinary, not
to say exasperating, and who stood six feet three in his stockings.
Mivins, the steward, was, as we have already remarked, a tall, thin,
active young man, of a brisk, lively disposition, and was somewhat of a
butt among the men, but being in a position of power and trust he was
respected.  The young surgeon, Tom Singleton, whom we have yet scarcely
introduced to the reader, was a tall, slim, but firmly-knit, youth, with
a kind, gentle disposition.  He was always open, straightforward, and
polite.  He never indulged in broad humour, though he enjoyed it much,
seldom ventured on a witticism, was rather shy in the company of his
companions, and spoke little; but for a quiet, pleasant _tete-a-tete_
there was not a man in the ship equal to Tom Singleton.  His countenance
was Spanish-looking and handsome, his hair black, short, and curling,
and his budding moustache was soft and dark as the eyebrow of an
Andalusian belle.

It would be unpardonable, in this catalogue, to omit the cook, David
Mizzle.  He was round, and fat, and oily, as one of his own "duff"
puddings.  To look at him you could not help suspecting that he
purloined, and ate, at least half of the salt pork he cooked, and his
sly, dimpling laugh, in which every feature participated, from the point
of his broad chin to the top of his bald head, rather tended to favour
this supposition.  Mizzle was prematurely bald--being quite a young
man,--and, when questioned on the subject, he usually attributed it to
the fact of his having been so long employed about the cooking-coppers,
that the excessive heat to which he was exposed, had stewed all the hair
off his head!  The crew was made up of stout, active men in the prime of
life, nearly all of whom had been more or less accustomed to the
whale-fishing, and some of the harpooners were giants in muscular
development and breadth of shoulder, if not in height.

Chief among these harpooners was Amos Parr, a short, thick-set, powerful
man of about thirty-five, who had been at sea since he was a little boy,
and had served in the fisheries of both the northern and southern seas.
No one knew what country had the honour of producing him--indeed, he was
ignorant of that point himself; for, although he had vivid recollections
of his childhood having been spent among green hills, and trees, and
streamlets, he was sent to sea with a strange captain before he was old
enough to care about the name of his native land.  Afterwards he ran
away from his ship, and so lost all chance of ever discovering who he
was; but, as he sometimes remarked, he didn't much care who he was, so
long as he was _himself_; so it didn't matter.  From a slight
peculiarity in his accent, and other qualities, it was surmised that he
must be an Irishman--a supposition which he rather encouraged, being
partial to the sons, and particularly partial to the daughters, of the
Emerald Isle, one of which last he had married just six months before
setting out on this whaling expedition.

Such was the _Dolphin_ and her crew, and merrily they bowled along over
the broad Atlantic with favouring winds, and without meeting with
anything worthy of note until they neared the coast of Greenland.

One fine morning, just as the party in the cabin had finished breakfast,
and were dallying with the last few morsels of the repast, as men who
have more leisure than they desire, are wont to do, there was a sudden
shock felt, and a slight tremor passed through the ship, as if something
had struck her.

"Ha!" exclaimed Captain Guy, finishing his cup of chocolate, "there goes
the first bump."

"Ice ahead, sir!" said the first mate, looking down the skylight.

"Is there much?" asked the captain, rising and taking down a small
telescope, from the hook on which it usually hung.

"Not much, sir--only a stream; but there is an ice blink right ahead,
all along the horizon."

"How's her head, Mr Bolton?"

"Nor'-west and by north, sir."

Before this brief conversation came to a close, Fred Ellice and Tom
Singleton sprang up the companion, and stood on the deck gazing ahead
with feelings of the deepest interest.  Both youths were well read in
the history of polar seas and regions; they were well acquainted, by
name at least, with floes, and bergs, and hummocks of ice, but neither
of them had seen such in reality.  These objects were associated in
their young minds with all that was romantic and wild, hyperborean and
polar, brilliant and sparkling, and light and white--emphatically
_white_.  To behold ice actually floating on the salt sea was an
incident of note in their existence; and certainly the impressions of
their first day in the ice remained sharp, vivid and prominent, long
after scenes of a much more striking nature had faded from the tablets
of their memories.

At first the prospect that met their ardent gaze was not calculated to
excite excessive admiration.  There were only a few masses of low ice
floating about in various directions.  The wind was steady, but light,
and seemed as if it would speedily fall altogether.  Gradually the
_blink_ on the horizon (as the light haze always distinguishable above
ice, or snow-covered land, is called) resolved itself into a long white
line of ice, which seemed to grow larger as the ship neared it, and in
about two hours more they were fairly in the midst of the pack, which
was fortunately loose enough to admit of the vessel being navigated
through the channels of open water.  Soon after, the sun broke out in
cloudless splendour, and the wind fell entirely, leaving the ocean in a
dead calm.

"Let's go to the fore-top, Tom," said Fred, seizing his friend by the
arm, and hastening to the shrouds.

In a few seconds they were seated alone on the little platform at the
top of the fore-mast, just where it is connected with the fore-top-mast,
and from this elevated position they gazed in silent delight upon the
fairy-like scene.

Those who have never stood at the mast-head of a ship at sea, in a dead
calm, cannot comprehend the feeling of intense solitude, that fills the
mind in such a position.  There is nothing analogous to it on land.  To
stand on the summit of a tower and look down on the busy multitude below
is not the same, for there the sounds are quite different in _tone_, and
signs of life are visible all over the distant country, while cries from
afar reach the ear, as well as those from below.  But from the mast-head
you hear only the few subdued sounds under your feet--all beyond is
silence; you behold only the small oval-shaped platform that is your
world--beyond lies the calm, desolate ocean.  On deck you cannot realise
this feeling, for there sails and yards tower above you, and masts, and
boats, and cordage, intercept your view; but from above you _take in_
the intense minuteness of your home at a single glance--you stand aside,
as it were, and, in some measure, comprehend the insignificance of the
_thing_ to which you have committed your life.

The scene witnessed by our friends at the mast-head of the _Dolphin_ on
this occasion was surpassingly beautiful.  Far as the eye could stretch,
the sea was covered with islands and fields of ice of every conceivable
shape.  Some rose in little peaks and pinnacles, some floated in the
form of arches and domes, some were broken and rugged, like the ruins of
old border strongholds, while others were flat and level, like fields of
white marble; and so calm was it that the ocean in which they floated
seemed like a groundwork of polished steel, in which the sun shone with
dazzling brilliancy.  The tops of the icy islets were pure white, and
the sides of the higher ones of a delicate blue colour, which gave to
the scene a transparent lightness that rendered it pre-eminently
fairy-like.

"It far surpasses anything I ever conceived," ejaculated Singleton after
a long silence.  "No wonder that authors speak of scenes being
indescribable.  Does it not seem like a dream, Fred?"

"Tom," said Fred earnestly, "I've been trying to fancy myself in another
world, and I have almost succeeded.  When I look long and intensely at
the ice, I get almost to believe that these are streets, and palaces,
and cathedrals.  I never felt so strong a desire to have wings, that I
might fly from one island to another, and go floating in and out, and
round about, those blue caves and sparkling pinnacles."

"It's a curious fancy, Fred, but not unnatural."

"Tom," said Fred, after another long silence, "has not the thought
occurred to you that God made it all?"

"Some such thought did cross my mind, Fred, for a moment, but it soon
passed away.  Is it not _very_ strange that the idea of the Creator is
so seldom, and so slightly, connected with his works in our minds?"

Again there was a long silence.  Both youths had a desire to continue
the conversation, and yet each felt an unaccountable reluctance to renew
it.  Neither of them distinctly understood that the natural heart is
enmity against God, and that, until he is converted by the Holy Spirit,
man neither loves to think of his Maker, nor to speak of him.

While they sat thus musing, a breeze dimmed the surface of the sea, and
the _Dolphin_, which had hitherto lain motionless in one of the numerous
canals, began slowly to advance between the islands of ice.  The breeze
freshened, and rendered it impossible to avoid an occasional collision
with the floating masses; but the good ship was well armed for the
fight, and, although she quivered under the blows, and once or twice
recoiled, she pushed her way through the pack gallantly.  In the course
of an hour or two they were once more in comparatively clear water.

Suddenly there came a cry from the crow's-nest: "There she blows!"

Instantly every man in the ship sprang to his feet as if he had received
an electric shock.

"Where away?" shouted the captain.

"On the lee-bow, sir," replied the look-out.

From a state of comparative quiet and repose the ship was now thrown
into a condition of the utmost animation, and, apparently, unmeaning
confusion.  The sight of a whale acted on the spirits of the men like
wild-fire.

"There she blows!" sang out the man at the mast-head again.

"Are we keeping right for her!" asked the captain.

"Keep her away a bit; steady!" replied the look-out.

"Steady it is!" answered the man at the wheel.

"Call all hands and get the boats out, Mr Bolton," said the captain.

"All hands ahoy!" shouted the mate in a tempestuous voice, while the men
rushed to their respective stations.  "Boat-steerers, get your boats
ready."

"Ay, ay, sir!"

"There go flukes!" cried the look-out as the whale dived and tossed its
flukes, that is its tail, in the air, not more than a mile on the
lee-bow; "she's heading right for the ship."

"Down with the helm!" roared the captain.  "Mr Bolton, brace up the
mizzen top-sail!  Hoist and swing the boats!  Lower away!"

In another moment three boats struck the water, and their respective
crews tumbled tumultuously into them.  Fred and Singleton sprang into
the stern-sheets of the captain's boat, just as it pushed off, and in
less than five minutes the three boats were bounding over the sea in the
direction of the whale like race-horses.  Every man did his best, and
the tough oars bent like hoops as each boat's crew strove to outstrip
the others.

CHAPTER FOUR.

THE CHASE AND THE BATTLE--THE CHANCES AND DANGERS OF WHALING WAR--BUZZBY
DIVES FOR HIS LIFE AND SAVES IT--SO DOES THE WHALE AND LOSES IT--AN
ANXIOUS NIGHT WHICH TERMINATES HAPPILY, THOUGH WITH A HEAVY LOSS.

The chase was not a long one, for, while the boats were rowing swiftly
towards the whale, the whale was, all unconsciously, swimming towards
the boats.

"Give way now, lads, give way," said the captain in a suppressed voice;
"bend your backs, boys, and don't let the mate beat us."

The three boats flew over the sea, as the men strained their muscles to
the utmost, and for some time they kept almost in line, being pretty
equally matched; but gradually the captain shot ahead, and it became
evident that his harpooner, Amos Parr, was to have the honour of
harpooning the first whale.  Amos pulled the bow oar, and behind him was
the tub with the line coiled away and the harpoon bent on to it.  Being
an experienced whaleman, he evinced no sign of excitement, save in the
brilliancy of his dark eye, and a very slight flush on his bronzed face.
They had now neared the whale, and ceased rowing for a moment, lest
they should miss it when down.

"There she goes!" cried Fred in a tone of intense excitement, as he
caught sight of the whale not more than fifty yards ahead of the boat.

"Now, boys," said the captain in a hoarse whisper, "spring hard, lay
back hard, I say--_stand up_!"

At the last word Amos Parr sprang to his feet, and seized the harpoon;
the boat ran right on to the whale's back, and in an instant Parr sent
two irons, to the hitches, into the fish.

"Stern all!"  The men backed their oars with all their might, in order
to avoid the flukes of the wounded monster of the deep, as it plunged
down headlong into the sea, taking the line out perpendicularly like
lightning.  This was a moment of great danger.  The friction of the
line, as it passed the loggerhead, was so great that Parr had to keep
constantly pouring water on it, to prevent its catching fire.  A hitch
in the line at that time, as it flew out of the tub, or any accidental
entanglement, would have dragged the boat and crew right down.  Many
such fatal accidents occur to whalers, and many a poor fellow has had a
foot or an arm torn off, or been dragged overboard and drowned, in
consequence of getting entangled.  One of the men stood ready with a
small hatchet to cut the line in a moment, if necessary, for whales
sometimes run out all that is in a boat at the first plunge, and should
none of the other boats be at hand, to lend a second line to attach to
the one nearly expended, there is nothing for it but to cut.  On the
present occasion, however, none of these accidents befel the men of the
captain's boat.  The line ran all clear, and long before it was
exhausted the whale ceased to descend, and the _slack_ was hauled
rapidly in.

Meanwhile the other boats pulled up to the scene of action, and prepared
to strike, the instant the fish should rise to the surface.  It appeared
suddenly, not twenty yards from the mate's boat, where Buzzby, who was
harpooner, stood in the bow ready to give it the iron.

"Spring, lads, spring!" shouted the mate, as the whale spouted into the
air a thick stream of water.  The boat dashed up, and Buzzby planted his
harpoon vigorously.  Instantly the broad flukes of the tail were tossed
into the air, and, for a single second, spread like a canopy over
Buzzby's head.  There was no escape.  The quick eye of the whaleman saw
at a glance that the effort to back out was hopeless.  He bent his head,
and the next moment was deep down in the waves.  Just as he disappeared,
the flukes descended on the spot which he had left, and cut the bow of
the boat completely away, sending the stern high into the air with a
violence that tossed men, and oars, and shattered planks, and cordage,
flying over the monster's back into the seething caldron of foam around
him.  It was apparently a scene of the most complete and instantaneous
destruction, yet, strange to say, not a man was lost.  A few seconds
after, the white foam of the sea was dotted with black heads, as the men
rose one by one to the surface, and struck out for floating oars and
pieces of the wrecked boat.

"They're lost!" cried Fred Ellice in a voice of horror.

"Not a bit of it, youngster; they're safe enough, I'll warrant," replied
the captain, as his own boat flew past the spot, towed by the whale.
"Pay out, Amos Parr; give him line, or he'll tear the bows out of us."

"Ay, ay, sir!" sang out Amos, as he sat coolly pouring water on the
loggerhead, round which a coil of the rope was whizzing like lightning;
"all right!  The mate's men are all safe, sir; I counted them as we shot
past, and I seed Buzzby come up last of all, blowin' like a grampus; and
small wonder, considerin' the dive he took."

"Take another turn of the coil, Amos, and hold on," said the captain.

The harpooneer obeyed, and away they went after the whale like a rocket,
with a tremendous strain on the line, and a bank of white foam gurgling
up to the edge of the gunwale, that every moment threatened to fill the
boat and sink her.  Such a catastrophe is not of unfrequent occurrence,
when whalemen, thus towed by a whale, are tempted to hold on too long;
and many instances have happened of boats and their crews being in this
way dragged under water and lost.  Fortunately the whale dashed
horizontally through the water, so that the boat was able to hold on and
follow, and in a short time the creature paused and rose for air.  Again
the men bent to their oars, and the rope was hauled in until they came
quite close to the fish.  This time a harpoon was thrown, and a deep
lance-thrust given which penetrated to the vital parts of its huge
carcass, as was evidenced by the blood which it spouted, and the
convulsive lashing of its tremendous tail.

While the captain's crew were thus engaged, Saunders, the second mate,
observing from the ship the accident to the first mate's boat, sent off
a party of men to the rescue, thus setting free the third boat, which
was steered by a strapping fellow named Peter Grim, to follow up the
chase.  Peter Grim was the ship's carpenter, and he took after his name.
He was, as the sailors expressed it, a "grim customer", being burnt by
the sun to a deep rich brown colour, besides being covered nearly up to
the eyes with a thick coal-black beard and moustache, which completely
concealed every part of his visage, except his prominent nose and dark,
fiery-looking eyes.  He was an immense man, the largest in the ship,
probably, if we except the Scotch second mate Saunders, to whom he was
about equal in all respects--except argument.  Like most big men, he was
peaceable and good-humoured.

"Look alive now, lads," said Grim, as the men pulled towards the whale;
"we'll get a chance yet, we shall, if you give way like tigers.  Split
your sides, boys--do--that's it.  Ah! there she goes, right down.  Pull
away now, and be ready when she rises."

As he spoke the whale suddenly _sounded_, that is, went perpendicularly
down, as it had done when first struck, and continued to descend until
most of the line in the captain's boat was run out.

"Hoist an oar," cried Amos Parr, as he saw the coil diminishing.  Grim
observed the signal of distress, and encouraged his men to use their
utmost exertions.  "Another oar!--another!" shouted Parr, as the whale
continued its headlong descent.  "Stand by to cut the line," said
Captain Guy with compressed lips.  "No! hold on, hold on!"

At this moment, having drawn down more than a thousand fathoms of rope,
the whale slackened its speed, and Parr, taking another coil round the
loggerhead, held on until the boat was almost dragged under water.  Then
the line became loose, and the slack was hauled in rapidly.  Meanwhile
Grim's boat had reached the spot and the men now lay on their oars at
some distance ahead, ready to pull the instant the whale should show
itself.  Up it came, not twenty yards ahead.  One short, energetic pull,
and the second boat sent a harpoon deep into it, while Grim sprang to
the bow, and thrust a lance with deadly force deep into the carcass.
The monster sent up a stream of mingled blood, oil, and water, and
whirled its huge tail so violently that the sound could be heard a mile
off.  Before it dived again, the captain's boat came up, and succeeded
in making fast another harpoon, while several additional lance-thrusts
were given with effect, and it seemed as if the battle were about to
terminate, when suddenly the whale struck the sea with a clap like
thunder, and darted away once more like a rocket to windward, tearing
the two boats after it, as if they had been egg-shells.

Meanwhile a change had come over the scene.  The sun had set, red and
lowering, behind a bank of dark clouds, and there was every appearance
of stormy weather; but as yet it was nearly calm, and the ship was
unable to beat up against the light breeze in the wake of the two boats,
which were soon far away on the horizon.  Then a furious gust arose and
passed away; a dark cloud covered the sky as night fell, and soon boats
and whale were utterly lost to view.

"Waes me," cried the big Scotch mate, as he ran up and down the
quarter-deck wringing his hands, "what _is_ to be done noo?"

Saunders spoke a mongrel kind of language--a mixture of Scotch and
English,--in which, although the Scotch words were sparsely scattered,
the Scotch accent was very strong.

"How's her head?"

"Nor'-nor'-west, sir."

"Keep her there, then.  Maybe, if the wind holds stiddy, we may overhaul
them before it's quite dark."

Although Saunders was really in a state of the utmost consternation at
this unexpected termination to the whale-hunt, and expressed the
agitation of his feelings pretty freely, he was too thorough a seaman to
neglect anything that was necessary to be done under the circumstances.
He took the exact bearings of the point at which the boats had
disappeared, and during the night, which turned out gusty and
threatening, kept making short tacks, while lanterns were hung at the
mast-heads, and a huge torch, or rather a small bonfire, of tarred
materials was slung at the end of a spar, and thrust out over the stern
of the ship.  But for many hours there was no sign of the boats, and the
crew of the _Dolphin_ began to entertain the most gloomy forebodings
regarding them.

At length, towards morning, a small speck of light was noticed on the
weather-beam.  It flickered for a moment, and then disappeared.

"Did ye see yon?" said Saunders to Mivins in an agitated whisper, laying
his huge hand on the shoulder of that worthy.  "Down your helm," (to the
steersman).

"Ay, ay, sir!"

"Stiddy!"

"Steady it is, sir!"

Mivins' face, which for some hours had worn an expression of deep
anxiety, relaxed into a bland smile, and he smote his thigh powerfully
as he exclaimed: "That's them, sir, _and_ no mistake!  What's your
opinion, Mr Saunders!"

The second mate peered earnestly in the direction in which the light had
been seen, and Mivins, turning in the same direction, screwed up his
visage into a knot of earnest attention, so complicated and intense that
it seemed as if no human power could evermore unravel it.

"There it goes again!" cried Saunders, as the light flashed distinctly
over the sea.

"Down helm; back fore-top-sails!" he shouted, springing forward; "lower
away the boat there!"

In a few seconds the ship was hove to, and a boat, with a lantern fixed
to an oar, was plunging over the swell in the direction of the light.
Sooner than was expected they came up with it, and a hurrah in the
distance told that all was right.

"Here we are, thank God," cried Captain Guy, "safe and sound!  We don't
require assistance, Mr Saunders; pull for the ship."

A short pull sufficed to bring the three boats alongside, and in a few
seconds more the crew were congratulating their comrades, with that
mingled feeling of deep heartiness, and a disposition to jest, which is
characteristic of men who are used to danger, and think lightly of it
after it is over.

"We've lost our fish, however," remarked Captain Guy, as he passed the
crew on his way to the cabin; "but we must hope for better luck next
time."

"Well, well," said one of the men, wringing the water out of his wet
clothes as he walked forward, "we got a good laugh at Peter Grim, if we
got nothin' else by our trip."

"How was that, Jack?"

"Why, ye see, jist before the whale gave in, it sent up a spout o' blood
and oil as thick as the main-mast, and, as luck would have it, down it
came slap on the head of Grim, drenchin' him from head to foot, and
makin' him as red as a lobster."

"'Ow did you lose the fish, sir?" enquired Mivins, as our hero sprang up
the side, followed by Singleton.

"Lost him as men lose money in railway speculations nowadays.  We _sank_
him, and that was the last of it.  After he had towed us I don't know
how far-out of sight of the ship at any rate,--he suddenly stopped, and
we pulled up and gave him some tremendous digs with the lances, until he
spouted jets of blood, and we made sure of him, when, all at once, down
he went head foremost like a cannon-ball, and took all the line out of
both boats, so we had to cut, and he never came up again.  At least, if
he did, it became so dark that we never saw him.  Then we pulled to
where we thought the ship was, and, after rowing nearly all night,
caught sight of your lights; and here we are, dead-tired, wet to the
skin, and minus about two miles of whale-line and three harpoons."

CHAPTER FIVE.

MISCELLANEOUS REFLECTIONS--THE COAST OF GREENLAND--UPPERNAVIK--NEWS OF
THE POLE STAR--MIDNIGHT DAY--SCIENTIFIC FACTS AND FAIRY-LIKE SCENES--TOM
SINGLETON'S OPINION OF POOR OLD WOMEN--IN DANGER OF A SQUEEZE--ESCAPE.

In pursuance of his original intention, Captain Guy now proceeded
through Davis' Straits into Baffin's Bay, at the head of which he
intended to search for the vessel of his friend Captain Ellice, and
afterwards prosecute the whale-fishery.  Off the coast of Greenland,
many whalers were seen, actively engaged in warfare with the giants of
the Polar Seas, and to several of these Captain Guy spoke, in the faint
hope of gleaning some information as to the fate or the _Pole Star_, but
without success.  It was now apparent to the crew of the _Dolphin_ that
they were engaged as much on a searching, as a whaling expedition; and
the fact that the commander of the lost vessel was the father of "young
Mr Fred", as they styled our hero, induced them to take a deep interest
in the success of their undertaking.

This interest was further increased by the graphic account that honest
John Buzzby gave of the death of poor Mrs Ellice, and the enthusiastic
way in which he spoke of his old captain.  Fred, too, had, by his frank,
affable manner, and somewhat reckless disposition, rendered himself a
general favourite with the men, and had particularly recommended himself
to Mivins the steward (who was possessed of an intensely romantic
spirit), by stating once or twice, very emphatically, that he (Fred)
meant to land on the coast of Baffin's Bay, should the captain fail to
find his father, and continue the search on foot and alone.  There was
no doubt whatever that poor Fred was in earnest, and had made up his
mind to die in the search, rather than not find him.  He little knew the
terrible nature of the country in which for a time his lot was to be
cast, and the hopelessness of such an undertaking as he meditated.  With
boyish inconsiderateness he thought not of how his object was to be
accomplished; he cared not what impossibilities lay in the way, but with
manly determination he made up his mind to quit the ship and search for
his father through the length and breadth of the land.  Let not the
reader smile at what he may perhaps style a childish piece of
enthusiasm.  Many a youth, at his age, has dreamed of attempting as
great if not greater impossibilities.  All honour, we say, to the boy
who _dreams_ impossibilities, and greater honour to him who, like Fred,
_resolves to attempt them_!  James Watt stared at an iron tea kettle
till his eyes were dim, and meditated the monstrous impossibility of
making that kettle work like a horse; and men might (perhaps did) smile
at James Watt _then_; but do men smile at James Watt _now_--now that
thousands of iron kettles are dashing, like dreadful comets, over the
length and breadth of the land, not to mention the sea, with long tails
of men, and women, and children behind them?

"That's 'ow it is, sir," Mivins used to say, when spoken to by Fred on
the subject, "I've never bin in cold countries myself, sir, but I've bin
in 'ot, and I knows that with a stout pair o' legs, and a will to work,
a man can work 'is way hanywhere.  Of course there's not much of a
pop'lation in them parts, I've heer'd; but there's Heskimos, and where
one man can live, so can another, and what one man can do, so can
another--that's bin my hexperience, and I'm not ashamed to hown it, I'm
not, though I _do_ say it as shouldn't, and I honour you, sir, for your
filleral detarmination to find your father, sir, and--"

"Steward!" shouted the captain down the cabin skylight.

"Yes, sir!"

"Bring me the chart."

"Yes, sir!" and Mivins disappeared like a Jack-in-the-box from the cabin
just as Tom Singleton entered it.

"Here we are, Fred," he said, seizing a telescope that hung over the
cabin door, "within sight of the Danish settlement of Uppernavik; come
on deck and see it."

Fred needed no second bidding.  It was here that the captain had hinted
there would, probably, be some information obtained regarding the _Pole
Star_, and it was with feelings of no common interest the two friends
examined the low-roofed houses of this out-of-the-way settlement.

In an hour afterwards the captain and first mate, with our young
friends, landed amid the clamorous greetings of the entire population,
and proceeded to the residence of the governor, who received them with
great kindness and hospitality; but the only information they could
obtain was that, a year ago, Captain Ellice had been driven there in his
brig by stress of weather, and, after refitting and taking in a supply
of provisions, had set sail for England.

Here the _Dolphin_ laid in a supply of dried fish, and procured several
dogs, besides an Esquimaux interpreter and hunter, named Meetuck.

Leaving this little settlement, they stood out once more to sea, and
threaded their way among the ice, with which they were now well
acquainted in all its forms, from the mighty berg, or mountain of ice,
to the wide field.  They passed in succession one or two Esquimaux
settlements, the last of which, Votlik, is the most northerly point of
colonisation.  Beyond this all was terra incognita.  Here enquiry was
again made, through the medium of the Esquimaux interpreter, who had
been taken on board at Uppernavik, and they learned that the brig in
question had been last seen, beset in the pack, and driving to the
northward.  Whether or not she had ever returned, they could not tell.

A consultation was now held, and it was resolved to proceed north as far
as the ice would permit, towards Smith's Sound, and examine the coast
carefully in that direction.

For several weeks past there had been gradually coming over the aspect
of nature, a change to which we have not yet referred, and which filled
Fred Ellice and his friend, the young surgeon, with surprise and
admiration; this was the long-continued daylight, which now lasted the
whole night round, and increased in intensity every day, as they
advanced north.  They had, indeed, often heard and read of it before,
but their minds had utterly failed to form a correct conception of the
exquisite calmness and beauty of the _midnight-day_ of the north.

Everyone knows that, in consequence of the axis of the earth not being
perpendicular to the plane of its orbit round the sun, the poles are
alternately directed more or less _towards_ that great luminary during
one part of the year, and _away_ from it during another part.  So that,
far north, the days during the one season grow longer and longer until,
at last, there is _one long day_ of many weeks' duration, in which the
sun does not set at all; and during the other season there is _one long
night_, in which the sun is never seen.  It was approaching the height
of the summer season when the _Dolphin_ entered the Arctic regions, and,
although the sun descended below the horizon for a short time each
night, there was scarcely any diminution of the light at all, and, as
far as one's sensations were concerned, there was but one long
continuous day, which grew brighter and brighter at midnight, as they
advanced.

"How thoroughly splendid this is," remarked Tom Singleton to Fred one
night, as they sat in their favourite out-look, the main-top, gazing
down on the glassy sea, which was covered with snowy icebergs and floes,
and bathed in the rays of the sun, "and how wonderful to think that the
sun will only set for an hour or so, and then get up as splendid as
ever!"

The evening was still as death.  Not a sound broke upon the ear save the
gentle cries of a few sea-birds, that dipped ever and anon into the sea,
as if to kiss it gently while asleep, and then circled slowly into the
bright sky again.  The sails of the ship, too, flapped very gently, and
a spar creaked plaintively, as the vessel rose and fell on the gentle
undulations that seemed to be the breathing of the ocean; but such
sounds did not disturb the universal stillness of the hour; neither did
the gambols of yonder group of seals and walrus, that were at play round
some fantastic blocks of ice; nor did the soft murmur of the swell that
broke in surf at the foot of yonder iceberg, whose blue sides were
seamed with a thousand water-courses, and whose jagged pinnacles rose up
like needles of steel into the clear atmosphere.

There were many bergs in sight, of various shapes and sizes, at some
distance from the ship, which caused much anxiety to the captain,
although they were only a source of admiration to our young friends in
the main-top.

"Tom," said Fred, breaking a long silence, "it may seem a strange idea
to you, but, do you know, I cannot help fancying that heaven must be
something like this."

"I'm not sure that that's such a strange idea, Fred, for it has two of
the characteristics of heaven in it--peace and rest."

"True; that didn't strike me.  Do you know, I wish that it were always
calm like this, and that we had no wind at all."

Tom smiled.  "Your voyage would be a long one if that were to happen.  I
dare say the Esquimaux would join with you in the wish, however, for
their kayaks and oomiaks are better adapted for a calm than a stormy
sea."

"Tom," said Fred, breaking another long silence, "you're very tiresome
and stupid tonight; why don't you talk to me?"

"Because this delightful dreamy evening inclines me to think and be
silent."

"Ah, Tom! that's your chief fault.  You are always inclined to think too
much, and to talk too little.  Now I, on the contrary, am always--"

"Inclined to talk too much, and think too little; eh, Fred?"

"Bah! don't try to be funny, man; you haven't it in you.  Did you ever
see such a miserable set of creatures as the old Esquimaux women are, at
Uppernavik?"

"Why, what put _them_ into your head?" enquired Tom, laughing.

"Yonder iceberg; look at it!  There's the nose and chin, exactly, of the
extraordinary hag you gave your silk pocket-handkerchief to at parting.
Now, I never saw such a miserable old woman as that before; did you?"

Tom Singleton's whole demeanour changed, and his dark eyes brightened as
the strongly marked brows frowned over them, while he replied: "Yes,
Fred, I have seen old women more miserable than that.  I have seen women
so old that their tottering limbs could scarcely support them, going
about in the bitterest November winds, with clothing too scant to cover
their wrinkled bodies, and so ragged and filthy, that you would have
shrunk from touching it--I have seen such groping about among heaps of
filth that the very dogs looked at, and turned away as if in disgust."

Fred was inclined to laugh at his friend's sudden change of manner, but
there was something in the young surgeon's character--perhaps its deep
earnestness--that rendered it impossible, at least for his friends, to
be jocular when he was disposed to be serious.  Fred became grave as he
spoke.

"Where have you seen such poor wretches, Tom?" he asked with a look of
interest.

"In the cities, the civilised cities of our own Christian land.  If you
have ever walked about the streets of some of these cities, before the
rest of the world was astir, at grey dawn, you must have seen them
shivering along, and scratching among the refuse cast out by the tenants
of the neighbouring houses.  Oh, Fred, Fred, in my professional career,
short though it has been, I have seen much of these poor old women, and
many others, whom the world never sees on the streets at all,
experiencing a slow, lingering death by starvation, and fatigue, and
cold.  It is the foulest blot on our country, that there is no
sufficient provision for the _aged poor_."

"I have seen those old women too," replied Fred, "but I never thought
very seriously about them before."

"That's it--that's just it; people don't _think_, otherwise this
dreadful state of things would not continue.  Just listen _now_, for a
moment, to what I have to say.  But don't imagine that I'm standing up
for the poor in general.  I don't feel--perhaps I'm wrong," continued
Tom thoughtfully,--"perhaps I'm wrong--I hope not--but it's a fact I
don't feel much for the young and the sturdy poor, and I make it a rule
_never_ to give a farthing to _young_ beggars, not even to little
children, for I know full well that they are sent out to beg by idle,
good-for-nothing parents.  I stand up only for the _aged_ poor, because,
be they good or wicked, they _cannot_ help themselves.  If a man fell
down in the street, struck with some dire disease that shrunk his
muscles, unstrung his nerves, made his heart tremble, and his skin
shrivel up, would you look upon him and then pass him by _without
thinking_?"

"No!" cried Fred in an emphatic tone; "I would not!  I would stop and
help him."

"Then, let me ask you," resumed Tom earnestly, "is there any difference
between the weakness of muscle and the faintness of heart which is
produced by disease, and that which is produced by old age, except that
the latter is incurable?  Have not these women feelings like other
women?  Think you that there are not amongst them those who have `known
better times?'  They think of sons and daughters dead and gone, perhaps,
just as other old women in better circumstances do; but they must not
indulge such depressing thoughts, they must reserve all the energy, the
stamina, they have, to drag round the city--barefoot, it may be, and in
the cold--to beg for food, and scratch up what they can find among the
cinder-heaps.  They groan over past comforts and past times, perhaps,
and think of the days when their limbs were strong, and their cheeks
were smooth--for they were not always `hags',--and remember that _once_
they had friends who loved them and cared for them, although they are
old, unknown, and desolate now."

Tom paused and pressed his hand upon his flushed forehead.

"You may think it strange," he continued, "that I speak to you in this
way about poor old women, but I feel _deeply_ for their forlorn
condition.  The young can help themselves, more or less, and they have
strength to stand their sorrows, with _hope_, blessed hope, to keep them
up; but _poor_ old men and old women cannot help themselves and cannot
stand their sorrows, and, as far as this life is concerned, they have
_no hope_; except to die soon and easy, and, if possible, in
summer-time, when the wind is not so very cold and bitter."

"But how can this be put right, Tom?" asked Fred in a tone of deep
commiseration.  "Our being sorry for it, and anxious about it (and
you've made me sorry, I assure you) can do very little good, you know."

"I don't know, Fred," replied Tom, sinking into his usual quiet tone.
"If every city and town in Great Britain would start a society whose
first resolution should be that they would not leave one poor _old_ man
or woman unprovided for, _that_ would do it.  Or if the Government would
take it in hand _honestly_, that would do it."

"Call all hands, Mr Bolton," cried the captain in a sharp voice.  "Get
out the ice-poles, and lower away the boats."

"Hallo! what's wrong!" said Fred, starting up.

"Getting too near the bergs, I suspect," remarked Tom.  "I say, Fred,
before we go on deck, will you promise to do what I ask you?"

"Well--yes, I will."

"Will you promise, then, all through your life, especially if you ever
come to be rich or influential, to think _of_, and _for_, old men and
women who are poor?"

"I will," answered Fred, "but I don't know that I'll ever be rich, or
influential, or able to help them much."

"Of course you don't.  But when a thought about them strikes you, will
you always _think it out_, and, if possible, _act it out_, as God shall
enable you?"

"Yes, Tom, I promise to do that as well as I can."

"That's right, thank you, my boy!" said the young surgeon, as they
descended the shrouds and leaped on deck.

Here they found the captain walking up and down rapidly, with an anxious
expression of face.  After taking a turn or two he stopped short, and
gazed out astern.

"Set the stun'sails, Mr Bolton.  The breeze will be up in a little, I
think.  Let the men pull with a will."

The order was given, and soon the ship was under a cloud of canvas,
advancing slowly as the boats towed her between two large icebergs,
which had been gradually drawing near to each other the whole afternoon.

"Is there any danger, Buzzby?" enquired Fred, as the sturdy sailor stood
looking at the larger berg, with an ice-pole in his hands.

"Danger! ay, that there is, lad! more nor's agreeable, d'ye see.  Here
we are without a breath o' wind to get us on, right between two bergs as
could crack us like a walnut.  We can't get to starboard of 'em for the
current, nor to larboard of 'em for the pack, as ye see, so we must go
between them, neck or nothing."

The danger was indeed imminent.  The two bergs were within a hundred
yards of each other, and the smaller of the two, being more easily moved
by the current, probably, was setting down on the larger at a rate that
bade fair to decide the fate of the _Dolphin_ in a few minutes.  The men
rowed lustily, but their utmost exertions could move the ship but
slowly.  Aid was coming, however, direct from the hand of Him who is a
refuge in the time of danger.  A breeze was creeping over the calm sea
right astern, and it was to meet this that the studding sails had been
set a-low and aloft, so that the wide-spreading canvas, projecting far
to the right and left, had, to an inexperienced eye, the appearance of
being out of all proportion to the little hull, by which it was
supported.

With breathless anxiety those on board stood watching the two bergs and
the approaching breeze.

At last it came.  A few cat's-paws ruffled the surface of the sea,
distending the sails for a moment, then leaving them flat and loose as
before.  This, however, was sufficient; another such puff and the ship
was almost out of danger, but before it came, the projecting summit of
the smaller berg was overhanging the deck.  At this critical moment the
wind began to blow steadily, and soon the _Dolphin_ was in the open
water beyond.  Five minutes after she had passed, the moving mountains
struck with a noise louder than thunder; the summits and large portions
of the sides fell, with a succession of crashes like the roaring of
artillery, just above the spot where the ship had lain not quarter of an
hour before, and the vessel, for some time after, rocked violently to
and fro, in the surges that the plunge of the falling masses raised.

CHAPTER SIX.

THE GALE--ANCHORED TO A BERG WHICH PROVES TO BE A TREACHEROUS ONE--
DANGERS OF THE "PACK"--BESET IN THE ICE--MIVINS SHOWS AN ENQUIRING
MIND--WALRUS--GALE FRESHENS--CHAINS AND CABLES--HOLDING ON FOR LIFE--AN
UNEXPECTED DISCOVERY--A "NIP" AND ITS TERRIBLE CONSEQUENCES--YOKED TO AN
ICEBERG.

The narrow escape related in the last chapter was but the prelude to a
night of troubles.  Fortunately, as we have before mentioned, _night_
did not now add darkness to their difficulties.  Soon after passing the
bergs, a stiff breeze sprang up off shore, between which and the
_Dolphin_ there was a thick belt of loose ice, or sludge, while outside,
the pack was in motion, and presented a terrible scene of crashing and
grinding masses under the influence of the breeze, which soon freshened
to a gale.

"Keep her away two points," said Captain Guy to the man at the wheel;
"we'll make fast to yonder berg, Mr Bolton; if this gale carries us
into the pack, we shall be swept far out of our course, if, indeed, we
escape being nipped and sent to the bottom."

Being nipped is one of the numberless dangers to which Arctic navigators
are exposed.  Should a vessel get between two moving fields or floes of
ice, there is a chance, especially in stormy weather, of the ice being
forced together and squeezing in the sides of the ship; this is called
nipping.

"Ah!" remarked Buzzby, as he stood with folded arms by the capstan,
"many and many a good ship has been sent to the bottom by that same.
I've see'd a brig, with my own two eyes, squeezed together a'most flat
by two big floes of ice, and after doin' it they jist separated agin an'
let her go plump down to the bottom.  Before she was nipped, the crew
saved themselves by jumpin' on to the ice, and they wos picked up by our
ship that wos in company."

"There's no dependin' on the ice, by no means," remarked Amos Parr, "for
I've see'd the self-same sort of thing that ye mention happen to a small
schooner in Davis Straits, only, instead o' crushin' it flat, the ice
lifted it right high and dry out o' the water, and then let it down
again, without more ado, as sound as iver."

"Get out the warps and ice-anchors, there," cried the captain.

In a moment the men were in the boats, and busy heaving and planting
ice-anchors, but it was not until several hours had been spent in this
tedious process that they succeeded in making fast to the berg.  They
had barely accomplished this when the berg gave indications of breaking
up, so they cast off again in great haste, and, not long afterwards, a
mass of ice, many tons in weight, fell from the edge of the berg close
to where they had been moored.

The captain now beat up for the land in the hope of finding
anchoring-ground.  At first the ice presented an impenetrable barrier,
but at length a lead of open water was found, through which they passed
to within a few hundred yards of the shore, which, at this spot, showed
a front of high precipitous cliffs.

"Stand by to let go the anchor," shouted the captain.

"Ay, ay, sir!"

"Down your helm!  Let go!"

Down went the anchor to the music of the rattling chain-cable, a sound
which had not been heard since the good ship left the shores of Old
England.

"If we were only a few yards farther in, sir," remarked the first mate,
"we should be better.  I'm afraid of the stream of ice coming round
yonder point."

"So am I," replied the captain; "but we can scarcely manage it, I fear,
on account of the shore ice.  Get out a boat, Mr Saunders, and try to
fix an anchor.  We may warp in a few yards."

The anchor was fixed, and the men strained at the capstan with a will,
but, notwithstanding their utmost efforts, they could not penetrate the
shore ice.  Meanwhile the wind increased, and snow began to fall in
large flakes.  The tide, too, as it receded, brought a stream of ice
round the point ahead of them, which bore right down on their bows.  At
first the concussions were slight, and the bow of the ship turned the
floes aside, but heavier masses soon came down, and at last one fixed
itself on the cable, and caused the anchor to drag with a harsh, grating
sound.

Fred Ellice, who stood beside the second mate, near the companion hatch,
looked enquiringly at him.

"Ah! that's bad," said Saunders, shaking his head slowly, "I dinna like
that sound.  If we're carried out into the pack there, dear knows where
we'll turn up in the long run."

"Perhaps we'll turn bottom up, sir," suggested the fat cook, as he
passed, at the moment with a tray of meat.  Mizzle could not resist a
joke--no matter how unsuitable the time or dreadful the consequences.

"Hold your tongue, sir," exclaimed Saunders indignantly.  "Attend to
your business, and speak only when you're spoken to."

With some difficulty the mass of ice that had got foul of the cable was
disengaged, but in a few moments another and a larger mass fixed upon
it, and threatened to carry it away.  In this extremity the captain
ordered the anchor to be hove up, but this was not easily accomplished,
and when at last it was hove up to the bow, both flukes were found to
have been broken off, and the shank was polished bright with rubbing on
the rocks.

Ice now came rolling down in great quantities and with irresistible
force, and at last the ship was whirled into the much-dreaded pack,
where she became firmly embedded, and drifted along with it before the
gale into the unknown regions of the north all that night.  To add to
their distress and danger a thick fog overspread the sea, so that they
could not tell whither the ice was carrying them, and to warp out of it
was impossible.  There was nothing for it, therefore, but to drive
before the gale and take advantage of the first opening in the ice that
should afford them a chance of escape.

Towards evening of the following day the gale abated, and the sun shone
out bright and clear, but the pack remained close as ever, drifting
steadily towards the north.

"We're far beyond the most northerly sea that has ever yet been
reached," remarked Captain Guy to Fred and Singleton, as he leaned on
the weather bulwarks, and gazed wistfully over the fields of ice in
which they were embedded.

"I beg your pardon for differing, Captain Guy, but I think that Captain
Parry was farther north than this when he attempted to reach the pole,"
remarked Saunders, with the air of a man who was prepared to defend his
position to the last.

"Very possibly, Mr Saunders, but I think we are at least farther north
in _this_ direction than anyone has yet been; at least I make it out so
by the chart."

"I'm no sure o' that," rejoined the second mate positively; "charts are
not always to be depended on, and I've heard that whalers have been up
hereabouts before now."

"Perhaps you are right, Mr Saunders," replied the captain, smiling;
"nevertheless I shall take observations and name the various headlands
until I find that others have been here before me.  Mivins, hand me the
glass; it seems to me there's a water-sky to the northward."

"What is a water-sky, Captain?" enquired Fred.

"It is a peculiar, dark appearance of the sky on the horizon, which
indicates open water--just the reverse of that bright appearance which
you have often seen in the distance, and which we call the ice-blink."

"We'll have open water soon," remarked the second mate authoritatively.

"Mr Saunders," said Mivins, who, having just finished clearing away and
washing up the debris and dishes of one meal, was enjoying in complete
idleness the ten minutes of leisure that intervened between that and
preparations for the next,--"Mr Saunders, sir, can you hinform me, sir,
'ow it is that the sea don't freeze at 'ome the same as it does hout
'ere?"

The countenance of the second mate brightened, for he prided himself not
a little on his vast and varied stores of knowledge, and nothing pleased
him so much as to be questioned, particularly on knotty subjects.

"Hem! yes, Mivins, I can tell 'ee that.  Ye must know that before fresh
water can freeze on the surface the whole volume of it must be cooled
down to 40 degrees, and _salt_ water must be cooled down to 45 degrees.
Noo, frost requires to be very long continued and very sharp indeed
before it can cool the deep sea from the top to the bottom, and until it
is so cooled it canna freeze."

"Oh!" remarked Mivins, who only half understood the meaning of the
explanation, "'ow very hodd.  But can you tell me, Mr Saunders, 'ow it
is that them 'ere hicebergs is made?  Them's wot I don't comprehend no
'ow."

"Ay," replied Saunders, "there has been many a wiser head than yours
puzzled for a long time aboot icebergs.  But if ye'll use yer eyes
you'll see how they are formed.  Do you see the high cliffs yonder away
to the nor'-east?  Well, there are great masses o' ice that have been
formed against them by the melting and freezing of the snows of many
years.  When these become too heavy to stick to the cliffs, they tumble
into the sea and float away as icebergs.  But the biggest bergs come
from the foot of glaciers.  We know what glaciers are, Mivins!"

"No, sir, I don't."

The second mate sighed.  "They are immense accumulations of ice, Mivins,
that have been formed by the freezings and meltings of the snows of
hundreds of years.  They cover the mountains of Norway and Switzerland,
and many other places in this world, for miles and miles in extent, and
sometimes they flow down and fill up whole valleys.  I once saw one in
Norway that filled up a valley eight miles long, two miles broad, and
seven or eight hundred feet deep, and that was only a wee bit of it, for
I was told by men who had travelled over it that it covered the
mountains of the interior, and made them a level field of ice, with a
surface like rough, hard snow, for more than twenty miles in extent."

"You don't say so, sir!" said Mivins in surprise.  "And don't they
_never_ melt?"

"No, never.  What they lose in summer they more than gain in winter.
Moreover, they are always in motion, but they move so slow that you may
look at them ever so closely and so long, you'll not be able to observe
the motion--just like the hour hand of a watch,--but we know it by
observing the changes from year to year.  There are immense glaciers
here in the Arctic regions, and the lumps which they are constantly
shedding off into the sea are the icebergs that one sees and hears so
much about."

Mivins seemed deeply impressed with this explanation, and would probably
have continued the conversation much longer had he not been interrupted
by the voice of his mischievous satellite, Davie Summers, who touched
his forelock and said: "Please, Mr Mivins, shall I lay the table-cloth,
or would it be better to slump dinner with tea this afternoon?"

Mivins started.  "Ha! caught me napping!  Down below, you young dog!"

The boy dived instantly, followed first by a dish-clout, rolled tightly
up and well aimed, and afterwards by his active-limbed superior.  Both
reached the region of smells, cruets, and crockery at the same moment,
and each set energetically to work at their never-ending duties.

Soon after this the ice suddenly loosened, and the crew succeeded, after
a few hours' hard labour, in warping the _Dolphin_ once more out of the
pack; but scarcely had this been accomplished when another storm, which
had been gradually gathering, burst upon them, and compelled them once
more to seek the shelter of the land.

Numerous walrus rolled about in the bays here, and they approached much
nearer to the vessel than they had yet done, affording those on board a
good view of their huge, uncouth visages, as they shook their shaggy
fronts and ploughed up the waves with their tusks.  These enormous
creatures are the elephants of the Arctic Ocean.  Their aspect is
particularly grim and fierce, and, being nearly equal to elephants in
bulk, they are not less terrible than they appear.  In form they
somewhat resemble seals, having barrel-shaped bodies, with round, or
rather square, blunt heads and shaggy bristling moustache, and two long
ivory tusks which curve downwards instead of upwards, serving the
purpose frequently of hooks, by means of which and their fore-flippers
they can pull themselves up on the rocks and icebergs.  Indeed they are
sometimes found at a considerable height up the sides of steep cliffs,
basking in the sun.

Fred was anxious to procure the skull of one of these monstrous animals,
but the threatening appearance of the weather rendered any attempt to
secure one at that time impossible.  A dark sinister scowl overhung the
blink under the cloud-bank to the southward, and the dovkies which had
enlivened their progress hitherto forsook the channel, as if they
distrusted the weather.  Captain Guy made every possible preparation to
meet the coming storm, by warping down under the shelter of a ledge of
rock, to which he made fast with two good hawsers, while everything was
made snug on board.

"We are going to catch it, I fear," said Fred, glancing at the black
clouds that hurried across the sky to the northward, while he walked the
deck with his friend, Tom Singleton.

"I suspect so," replied Tom, "and it does not raise my spirits to see
Saunders shaking his huge visage so portentously.  Do you know, I have a
great belief in that fellow.  He seems to know everything and to have
gone through every sort of experience, and I notice that most of his
prognostications come to pass."

"So they do, Tom," said Fred, "but I wish he would put a better face on
things till they _do_ come to pass.  His looks are enough to frighten
one."

"I think we shall require another line out, Mr Saunders," remarked the
captain, as the gale freshened, and the two hawsers were drawn straight
and rigid like bars of iron: "send ashore and make a whale-line fast
immediately."

The second mate obeyed with a grunt that seemed to insinuate that _he_
would have had one out long ago.  In a few minutes it was fast, and not
a moment too soon, for immediately after it blew a perfect hurricane.
Heavier and heavier it came, and the ice began to drift more wildly than
ever.  The captain had just given orders to make fast another line, when
the sharp, twanging snap of a cord was heard.  The six-inch hawser had
parted, and they were swinging by the two others, with the gale roaring
like a lion through the spars and rigging.  Half a minute more and
"twang, twang!" came another report, and the whale-line was gone.  Only
one rope now held them to the land, and prevented them being swept into
the turmoil of ice, and wind, and water, from which the rocky ledge
protected them.  The hawser was a good one--a new ten-inch rope.  It
sung like the deep tones of an organ, loud above the rattle of the
rigging and the shrouds, but that was its death-song.  It gave way with
the noise of a cannon, and in the smoke that followed its recoil, they
were dragged out by the wild ice and driven hither and hither at its
mercy.

With some difficulty the ship was warped into a place of comparative
security in the rushing drift, but it was soon thrown loose again, and
severely squeezed by the rolling masses.  Then an attempt was made to
set the sails and beat up for the land, but the rudder was almost
unmanageable owing to the ice, and nothing could be made of it, so they
were compelled to go right before the wind under close-reefed top-sails,
in order to keep some command of the ship.  All hands were on deck
watching in silence the ice ahead of them, which presented a most
formidable aspect.

Away to the north the strait could be seen growing narrower, with heavy
ice-tables grinding up and clogging it from cliff to cliff on either
side.  About seven in the evening they were close upon the piling
masses, to enter into which seemed certain destruction.

"Stand by to let go the anchor," cried the captain, in the desperate
hope of being able to wind the ship.

"What's that ahead of us?" exclaimed the first mate suddenly.

"Ship on the starboard bow, right inshore!" roared the look-out.

The attention of the crew was for a moment called from their own
critical situation towards the strange vessel which now came into view,
having been previously concealed from them by a large grounded berg.

"Can you make her out, Mr Bolton?"

"Yes, sir, I think she's a large brig, but she seems much chafed, and
there's no name left on the stern, if ever there was one."

As he spoke, the driving snow and fog cleared up partially, and the brig
was seen not three hundred yards from them, drifting slowly into the
loose ice.  There was evidently no one on board, and although one or two
of the sails were loose, they hung in shreds from the yards.  Scarcely
had this been noted when the _Dolphin_ struck against a large mass of
ice, and quivered under the violence of the shock.

"Let go!" shouted the captain.

Down went the heaviest anchor they had, and for two minutes the chain
flew out at the hawse-hole.

"Hold on!"

The chain was checked, but the strain was awful.  A mass of ice,
hundreds of tons weight, was tearing down towards the bow.  There was no
hope of resisting it.  Time was not even afforded to attach a buoy or
log to the cable, so it was let slip, and thus the _Dolphin's_ best
bower was lost for ever.

But there was no time to think of or regret this, for the ship was now
driving down with the gale, scraping against a lee of ice which was
seldom less than thirty feet thick.  Almost at the same moment the
strange vessel was whirled close to them, not more than fifty yards
distant, between two driving masses of thick ice.

"What if it should be my father's brig?" whispered Fred Ellice, as he
grasped Singleton's arm, and turned to him a face of ashy paleness.

"No fear of that, lad," said Buzzby, who stood near the larboard gangway
and had overheard the remark.  "I'd know your father's brig among a
thousand--"

As he spoke, the two masses of ice closed, and the brig was nipped
between them.  For a few seconds she seemed to tremble like a living
creature, and every timber creaked.  Then she was turned slowly on one
side, until the crew of the _Dolphin_ could see down into her hold,
where the beams were giving way and cracking up as matches might be
crushed in the grasp of a strong hand.  Then the larboard bow was
observed to yield as if it were made of soft clay, the starboard bow was
pressed out, and the ice was forced into the forecastle.  Scarcely three
minutes had passed since the nip commenced; in one minute more the brig
went down, and the ice was rolling wildly, as if in triumph, over the
spot where she had disappeared.

The fate of this vessel, which might so soon be their own, threw a
momentary gloom over the crew of the _Dolphin_, but their position left
them no time for thought.  One upturned mass rose above the gunwale,
smashed in the bulwarks, and deposited half a ton of ice on deck.
Scarcely had this danger passed when a new enemy appeared in sight
ahead.  Directly in their way, just beyond the line of floe-ice against
which they were alternately thumping and grinding, lay a group of bergs.
There was no possibility of avoiding them, and the only question was
whether they were to be dashed to pieces on their hard blue sides or,
perchance, in some providential nook to find a refuge from the storm.

"There's an open lead between them and the floe-ice," exclaimed Bolton
in a hopeful tone of voice, seizing an ice-pole and leaping on the
gunwale.

"Look alive, men, with your poles," cried the captain, "and shove with a
will."

The "Ay, ay, sir!" of the men was uttered with a heartiness that showed
how powerfully this gleam of hope acted on their spirits; but a new damp
was cast over them when, on gaining the open passage, they discovered
that the bergs were not at rest, but were bearing down on the floe-ice
with slow but awful momentum, and threatened to crush the ship between
the two.  Just then a low berg came driving up from the southward,
dashing the spray over its sides, and with its fore-head ploughing up
the smaller ice as if in scorn.  A happy thought flashed across the
captain's mind.  "Down the quarter boat," he cried.

In an instant it struck the water, and four men were on the thwarts.

"Cast an ice-anchor on that berg."

Peter Grim obeyed the order, and, with a swing that Hercules would have
envied, planted it securely.  In another moment the ship was following
in the wake of this novel tug!  It was a moment of great danger, for the
bergs encroached on their narrow canal as they advanced, obliging them
to brace the yards to clear the impending ice-walls, and they shaved the
large berg so closely that the port-quarter boat would have been crushed
if it had not been taken from the davits.  Five minutes of such
travelling brought them abreast of a grounded berg, to which they
resolved to make fast; the order was given to cast off the rope; away
went their white tug on his race to the far north, and the ship swung
round in safety under the lee of the berg, where the crew acknowledged
with gratitude their merciful deliverance from imminent danger.

CHAPTER SEVEN.

NEW CHARACTERS INTRODUCED--AN OLD GAME UNDER NOVEL CIRCUMSTANCES--
REMARKABLE APPEARANCES IN THE SKY--O'RILEY MEETS WITH A MISHAP.

Dumps was a remarkably grave and sly character, and Poker was a wag--an
incorrigible wag--in every sense of the term.  Moreover, although they
had an occasional fight, Dumps and Poker were excellent friends, and
great favourites with the crew.

We have not yet introduced these individuals to our reader; but as they
will act a conspicuous part in the history of the _Dolphin's_
adventurous career in the Arctic regions, we think it right now to
present them.

While at Uppernavik, Captain Guy had purchased a team of six good, tough
Esquimaux dogs, being desirous of taking them to England, and there
presenting them to several of his friends who were anxious to possess
specimens of those animals.  Two of these dogs stood out conspicuous
from their fellows, not only in regard to personal appearance, but also
in reference to peculiarities of character.  One was pure white, with a
lively expression of countenance, a large shaggy body, two erect,
sharp-pointed ears, and a short projection that once had been a tail.
Owing to some cause unknown, however, his tail had been cut or bitten
off, and nothing save the stump remained.  But this stump did as much
duty as if it had been fifty tails in one.  It was never at rest for a
moment, and its owner evidently believed that wagging it was the true
and only way to touch the heart of man; therefore the dog wagged it, so
to speak, doggedly.  In consequence of this animal's thieving
propensities, which led him to be constantly _poking_ into every hole
and corner of the ship in search of something to steal, he was named
_Poker_.  Poker had three jet-black spots in his white visage--one was
the point of his nose, the other two were his eyes.

Poker's bosom friend, Dumps, was so named because he had the sulkiest
expression of countenance that ever fell to the lot of a dog.
Hopelessly incurable melancholy seemed to have taken possession of his
mind, for he never by any chance smiled--and dogs do smile, you know,
just as evidently as human beings do, although not exactly with their
mouths.  Dumps never romped either, being old, but he sat and allowed
his friend Poker to romp round him with a sort of sulky satisfaction, as
if he experienced the greatest enjoyment his nature was capable of in
witnessing the antics of his youthful companion--for Poker was young.
The prevailing colour of Dumps's shaggy hide was a dirty brown, with
black spots, two of which had fixed themselves rather awkwardly round
his eyes, like a pair of spectacles.  Dumps, also, was a thief, and,
indeed, so were all his brethren.  Dumps and Poker were both of them
larger and stronger, and in every way better, than their comrades; and
they afterwards were the sturdy, steady, unflinching leaders of the team
during many a toilsome journey over the frozen sea.

One magnificent afternoon, a few days after the escape of the _Dolphin_
just related, Dumps and Poker lay side by side in the lee-scuppers,
calmly sleeping off the effects of a surfeit produced by the eating of a
large piece of pork, for which the cook had searched in vain for
three-quarters of an hour, and of which he at last found the bare bone
sticking in the hole of the larboard pump.

"Bad luck to them dogs!" exclaimed David Mizzle, stroking his chin as he
surveyed the bone.  "If I could only find out, now, which of ye it was,
I'd have ye slaughtered right off, and cooked for the mess, I would."

"It was Dumps as did it, I'll bet you a month's pay," said Peter Grim,
as he sat on the end of the windlass refilling his pipe, which he had
just smoked out.

"Not a bit of it," remarked Amos Parr, who was squatted on the deck
busily engaged in constructing a rope mat, while several of the men sat
round him engaged in mending sails, or stitching canvas slippers,
etcetera.  "Not a bit of it, Grim; Dumps is too honest by half to do
sich a thing.  'Twas Poker as did it, I can see by the roll of his eye
below the skin.  The blackguard's only shammin' sleep."

On hearing his name mentioned, Poker gently opened his right eye, but
did not move.  Dumps, on the contrary, lay as if he heard not the base
aspersion on his character.

"What'll ye bet it was Dumps as did it?" cried Davie Summers, who passed
at the moment with a dish of some sort of edible towards the galley or
cooking-house on deck.

"I'll _bet_ you over the 'ead, I will, if you don't mind your business,"
said Mivins.

"You'd _bet_ter not," retorted Davie with a grin.  "It's as much as your
situation's worth to lay a finger on me."

"That's it, youngster, give it 'im," cried several of the men, while the
boy confronted his superior, taking good care, however, to keep the
fore-mast between them.

"What do you mean, you young rascal?" cried Mivins with a frown.

"Mean!" said Davie, "why, I mean that if you touch me I'll resign
office; and if I do that, you'll have to go out, for everyone knows you
can't get on without me."

"I say, Mivins," cried Tom Green, the carpenter's mate, "if you were
asked to say: `Hold on hard to this handspike here, my hearties,' how
would ye go about it?"

"He'd 'it you a pretty 'ard crack hover the 'ead with it, 'e would,"
remarked one of the men, throwing a ball of yarn at Davie, who stood
listening to the conversation with a broad grin.

In stepping back to avoid the blow the lad trod on Dumps's paw, and
instantly there came from the throat of that excellent dog a roar of
anguish that caused Poker to leap, as the cook expressed it, nearly out
of his own skin.  Dogs are by nature extremely sympathetic and
remarkably inquisitive; and no sooner was Dumps's yell heard than it was
vigorously responded to by every dog in the ship, as the whole pack
rushed each from his respective sleeping-place, and looked round in
amazement.

"Hallo! what's wrong there for'ard?" enquired Saunders, who had been
pacing the quarter-deck with slow giant strides, arguing mentally with
himself in default of a better adversary.

"Only trod on Dumps's paw, sir," said Mivins as he hurried aft; "the men
are sky-larking."

"Sky-larking, are you?" said Saunders, going forward; "weel, lads,
you've had a lot o' hard work of late, ye may go and take a run on the
ice."

Instantly the men, like boys set free from school, sprang up, tumbled
over the side, and were scampering over the ice like madmen.

"Pitch over the ball!--the football!" they cried.  In a second the ball
was tossed over the ship's side, and a vigorous game was begun.

For two days past the _Dolphin_ had been sailing with difficulty through
large fields of ice, sometimes driving against narrow necks and tongues
that interrupted her passage from one lead, or canal, to another; at
other times boring with difficulty through compact masses of sludge, or,
occasionally, when unable to advance farther, making fast to a large
berg or field.  They were compelled to proceed north, however, in
consequence of the pack having become fixed towards the south, and thus
rendering retreat impossible in that direction until the ice should be
again set in motion.  Captain Guy, however, saw, by the steady advance
of the larger bergs, that the current of the ocean in that place flowed
southward, and trusted that in a short time the ice which had been
forced into the strait by the gales, would be released, and open up a
passage.  Meanwhile he pushed along the coast, examining every bay and
inlet in the hope of discovering some trace of the _Pole Star_ or her
crew.

On the day about which we are writing, the ship was beset by large
fields, the snow-white surfaces of which extended north and south to the
horizon, while on the east the cliffs rose in dark, frowning precipices
from the midst of the glaciers that encumber them all the year round.

It was a lovely Arctic day.  The sun shone with unclouded splendour, and
the bright air, which trembled with that liquidity of appearance that
one occasionally sees in very hot weather under peculiar circumstances,
was vocal with the wild music of thousands of gulls, and auks, and other
sea-birds, which clustered on the neighbouring cliffs, and flew overhead
in clouds.  All round, the pure surfaces of the ice-fields were broken
by the shadows which the hummocks and bergs cast over them, and by the
pools of clear water which shone like crystals in their hollows, while
the beautiful beryl blue of the larger bergs gave a delicate colouring
to the dazzling scene.  Words cannot describe the intense _glitter_ that
characterised everything.  Every point seemed a diamond; every edge sent
forth a gleam of light, and many of the masses reflected the rich
prismatic colours of the rainbow.  It seemed as if the sun himself had
been multiplied in order to add to the excessive brilliancy, for he was
surrounded by _parhelia_, or _sun-dogs_ as the men called them.  This
peculiarity in the sun's appearance was very striking.  The great orb of
day was about ten degrees above the horizon, and a horizontal line of
white passed completely through it extending to a considerable distance
on either hand, while around it were two distinct halos, or circles of
light.  On the inner halo were situated the mock-suns, which were four
in number--one above and one below the sun, and one on each side of him.

Not a breath of wind stirred the little flag that drooped from the
mizzen-peak, and the clamorous ceaseless cries of sea-birds, added to
the merry shouts and laughter of the men, as they followed the restless
football, rendered the whole a scene of life, as it was emphatically one
of beauty.

"Ain't it glorious?" panted Davie Summers vehemently, as he stopped
exhausted in a headlong race beside one of his comrades, while the ball
was kicked hopelessly beyond his reach by a comparatively fresh member
of the party.

"Ah! then, it bates the owld country intirely, it does," replied
O'Riley, wiping the perspiration from his forehead.

It is needless to say that O'Riley was an Irishman.  We have not
mentioned him until now, because up to this time he had not done
anything to distinguish himself beyond his messmates; but on this
particular day O'Riley's star was in the ascendant, and Fortune seemed
to have singled him out as an object of her special attention.  He was a
short man, and a broad man, and a particularly _rugged_ man--so to
speak.  He was all angles and corners.  His hair stuck about his head in
violently rigid and entangled tufts, rendering it a matter of wonder how
anything in the shape of a hat could stick on.  His brow was a countless
mass of ever-varying wrinkles, which gave to his sly visage an aspect of
humorous anxiety that was highly diverting--and all the more diverting
when you came to know that the man had not a spark of anxiety in his
composition, though he often said he had.  His dress, like that of most
Jack-tars, was naturally rugged, and he contrived to make it more so
than usual.

"An' it's hot, too, it is," he continued, applying his kerchief again to
his pate.  "If it warn't for the ice we stand on, we'd be melted down, I
do belave, like bits o' whale blubber."

"Wot a jolly game football is, ain't it?" said Davie, seating himself on
a hummock, and still panting hard.

"Ay, boy, that's jist what it is.  The only objiction I have agin it is
that it makes ye a'most kick the left leg clane off yer body."

"Why don't you kick with your right leg, then, stupid, like other
people?" enquired Summers.

"Why don't I, is it?  Troth, then, I don't know for sartin.  Me father
lost his left leg at the great battle o' the Nile, and I've sometimes
thought that had somethin' to do wid it; but then me mother was lame o'
the _right_ leg intirely, and wint about wid a crutch, so I can't make
out how it was, d'ye see?"

"Look out, Pat," exclaimed Summers, starting up, "here comes the ball."

As he spoke, the football came skimming over the ice, towards the spot
on which they stood, with about thirty of the men running at full speed
and shouting like maniacs after it.

"That's your sort, my hearties! another like that and it's home!  Pitch
into it, Mivins.  You're the boy for me.  Now, then, Grim, trip him up!
Hallo, Buzzby, you bluff-bowed Dutchman, luff! luff! or I'll stave in
your ribs!  Mind your eye, Mizzle, there's Green, he'll be into your
larboard quarter in no time.  Hurrah!  Mivins, up in the air with it.
Kick, boy, kick like a spanker boom in a hurricane!"

Such were a few of the expressions that showered like hail round the men
as they rushed hither and thither after the ball.  And here we may
remark that the crew of the _Dolphin_ played football in a somewhat
different style, from the way in which that noble game is played by boys
in England.  Sides, indeed, were chosen, and boundaries were marked out,
but very little if any attention was paid to such secondary matters!  To
kick the ball, and keep on kicking it in front of his companions, was
the ambition of each man; and so long as he could get a kick at it that
caused it to fly from the ground like a cannon-shot, little regard was
had by anyone to the direction in which it was propelled.  But, of
course, in this effort to get a kick, the men soon became scattered over
the field, and ever and anon the ball would fall between two men, who
rushed at it simultaneously from opposite directions.  The inevitable
result was a collision, by which both men were suddenly and violently
arrested in their career.  But generally the shock resulted in one of
the men being sent staggering backwards, and the other getting the
_kick_.  When the two were pretty equally matched, both were usually, as
they expressed it, "brought up all standing", in which case a short
scuffle ensued, as each endeavoured to trip up the heels of his
adversary.  To prevent undue violence in such struggles, a rule was laid
down that hands were not to be used on any account.  They might use
their feet, legs, shoulders, and elbows, but not their hands.

In such rough play the men were more equally matched than might have
been expected, for the want of weight among the smaller men was often
more than counterbalanced by their activity; and frequently a sturdy
little fellow launched himself so vigorously against a heavy tar as to
send him rolling head over heels on the ice.  This was not always the
case, however, and few ventured to come into collision with Peter Grim,
whose activity was on a par with his immense size.  Buzzby contented
himself with galloping on the outskirts of the fight, and putting in a
kick when fortune sent the ball in his way.  In this species of warfare
he was supported by the fat cook, whose oily carcass could neither stand
the shocks nor keep up with the pace of his messmates.  Mizzle was a
particularly energetic man in his way, however, and frequently kicked
with such good-will that he missed the ball altogether, and the
tremendous swing of his leg lifted him from the ice, and laid him
sprawling on his back.

"Look out ahead!" shouted Green, the carpenter's mate; "there's a sail
bearing down on your larboard bow."

Mivins, who had the ball before him at the moment, saw his own
satellite, Davie, coming down towards him with vicious intentions.  He
quietly pushed the ball before him for a few yards, then kicked it far
over the boy's head, and followed it up like an antelope.  Mivins
depended for success on his almost superhuman activity.  His tall,
slight frame could not stand the shocks of his comrades, but no one
could equal or come near to him in speed, and he was quite an adept at
dodging a _charge_, and allowing his opponent to rush far past the ball
by the force of his own momentum.  Such a charge did Peter Grim make at
him at this moment.

"Starboard hard!" yelled Davie Summers, as he observed his master's
danger.

"Starboard it is!" replied Mivins, and, leaping aside to avoid the
shock, he allowed Grim to pass.  Grim knew his man, however, and had
held himself in hand, so that in a moment he pulled up and was following
close on his heels.

"It's an ill wind that blows no good," cried one of the crew, towards
whose foot the ball rolled, as he quietly kicked it into the centre of
the mass of men.  Grim and Mivins turned back, and for a time looked on
at the general make that ensued.  It seemed as though the ball must
inevitably be crushed among them as they struggled and kicked hither and
thither for five minutes, in their vain efforts to get a kick; and
during those few exciting moments many tremendous kicks, aimed at the
ball, took effect upon shins, and many shouts of glee terminated in
yells of anguish.

"It can't last much longer!" screamed the cook, his face streaming with
perspiration, and beaming with glee, as he danced round the outside of
the circle.  "There it goes!"

As he spoke, the ball flew out of the circle, like a shell from a
mortar.  Unfortunately it went directly over Mizzle's head.  Before he
could wink he went down before them, and the rushing mass of men passed
over him like a mountain torrent over a blade of grass.

Meanwhile Mivins ran ahead of the others, and gave the ball a kick that
nearly burst it and down it came exactly between O'Riley and Grim, who
chanced to be far ahead of the others.  Grim dashed at it.  "Och! ye big
villain," muttered the Irishman to himself, as he put down his head and
rushed against the carpenter like a battering-ram.

Big though he was, Grim staggered back from the impetuous shock, and
O'Riley, following up his advantage, kicked the ball in a side
direction, away from everyone except Buzzby, who happened to have been
steering rather wildly over the field of ice.  Buzzby, on being brought
thus unexpectedly within reach of the ball, braced up his energies for a
kick, but seeing O'Riley coming down towards him like a runaway
locomotive, he pulled up, saying quietly to himself: "Ye may take it all
yer own way, lad; I'm too old a bird to go for to make my carcass a
buffer for a mad-cap like you to run agin."

Jack Mivins, however, was troubled by no such qualms.  He happened to be
about the same distance from the ball as O'Riley, and ran like a deer to
reach it first.  A pool of water lay in his path, however, and the
necessity of going round it enabled the Irishman to gain on him a
little, so that it became evident that both would come up at the same
moment and a collision be inevitable.

"Hold yer wind, Paddy," shouted the men, who paused for a moment to
watch the result of the race.  "Mind your timbers, Mivins!  Back your
top-sails, O'Riley; mind how he yaws!"

Then there was a momentary silence of breathless expectation.  The two
men seemed about to meet with a shock that would annihilate both, when
Mivins bounded to one side like an india-rubber ball.  O'Riley shot past
him like a rocket, and the next instant went head-foremost into the pool
of water.

This unexpected termination to the affair converted the intended huzzah
of the men into a yell of mingled laughter and consternation as they
hastened in a body to the spot; but before they reached it O'Riley's
head and shoulders reappeared, and when they came up, he was standing on
the margin of the pool blowing like a walrus.

"Oh, then, but it is cowld!" he exclaimed, wringing the water from his
garments.  "Och, where's the ball? give me a kick or I'll freeze, so I
will."

As he spoke, the drenched Irishman seized the ball from Mivins' hands
and gave it a kick that sent it high into the air.  He was too wet and
heavy to follow it up, however, so he ambled off towards the ship as
vigorously as his clothes would allow him, followed by the whole crew.

CHAPTER EIGHT.

FRED AND THE DOCTOR GO ON AN EXCURSION, IN WHICH, AMONG OTHER STRANGE
THINGS, THEY MEET WITH RED SNOW AND A WHITE BEAR, AND FRED MAKES HIS
FIRST ESSAY AS A SPORTSMAN.

But where were Fred Ellice and Tom Singleton all this time? the reader
will probably ask.

Long before the game at football was suggested, they had obtained leave
of absence from the captain, and, loaded with game-bags, a botanical
box, and geological hammer, and a musket, were off along the coast on a
semi-scientific cruise.  Young Singleton carried the botanical box and
hammer, being an enthusiastic geologist and botanist, while Fred carried
the game-bag and musket.

"You see, Tom," he said, as they stumbled along over the loose ice
towards the ice-belt that lined the cliffs,--"you see, I'm a great dab
at ornithology, especially when I've got a gun on my shoulder.  When I
haven't a gun, strange to say, I don't feel half so enthusiastic about
birds!"

"That's a very peculiar style of regarding the science.  Don't you think
it would be worth while communicating your views on the subject to one
of the scientific bodies when we get home again?  They might elect you a
member, Fred."

"Well, perhaps I shall," replied Fred gravely; "but I say, to be
serious, I'm really going to screw up my energies as much as possible,
and make coloured drawings of all the birds I can get hold of in the
Arctic regions.  At least I would like to try."

Fred finished his remark with a sigh, for just then the object for which
he had gone out to those regions occurred to him, and although the
natural buoyancy and hopefulness of his feelings enabled him generally
to throw off anxiety in regard to his father's fate, and join in the
laugh, and jest, and game as heartily as anyone on board, there were
times when his heart failed him, and he almost despaired of ever seeing
his father again; and these feelings of despondency had been more
frequent, since the day on which he witnessed the sudden and utter
destruction of the strange brig.

"Don't let your spirits down, Fred," said Tom, whose hopeful and earnest
disposition often reanimated his friend's drooping spirits.  "It will
only unfit you for doing any good service; besides, I think we have no
cause yet to despair.  We know that your father came up this inlet, or
strait, or whatever it is, and that he had a good stock of provisions
with him, according to the account we got at Uppernavik, and it is not
more than a year since he was there.  Many and many a whaler and
discovery ship has wintered more than a year in these regions.  And
then, consider the immense amount of animal life all around us.  They
might have laid up provisions for many months long before winter set
in."

"I know all that," replied Fred, with a shake of his head; "but think of
yon brig that we saw go down in about ten minutes."

"Well, so I do think of it.  No doubt the brig was lost very suddenly,
but there was ample time, had there been anyone on board, to have leaped
upon the ice, and they might have got to land by jumping from one piece
to another.  Such things have happened before, frequently.  To say
truth, at every point of land we turn, I feel a sort of expectation,
amounting almost to certainty, that we shall find your father and his
party travelling southward on their way to the Danish settlements."

"Perhaps you are right.  God grant that it may be so!"

As he spoke they reached the fixed ice which ran along the foot of the
precipices for some distance, like a road of hard white marble.  Many
large rocks lay scattered over it, some of them several tons in weight,
and one or two balanced in a very remarkable way on the edge of the
cliffs.

"There's a curious-looking gull I should like to shoot," exclaimed Fred,
pointing to a bird that hovered over his head, and throwing forward the
muzzle of his gun.

"Fire away, then," said his friend, stepping back a pace.

Fred, being unaccustomed to the use of firearms, took a wavering aim and
fired.

"What a bother!  I've missed it!"