Part 10 (2/2)
With a joyous ”hurrah” at the timely arrival of such unexpected assistance, the men roused the hawser on board, threw the eye over the bitts, passed two or three turns of the slack round the barrel of the windlass, and adjusted the rope in a ”fair-lead” with lightning rapidity Mild their nal to the baronet the instant he saw that the haas properly fast on board the barque, and the _Flying Fish_ ilide ahead The baronet was evidently bent on retrieving his character and ely-shaped vessel withthe strain upon the hawser very gradually, and, when he had done so, coaxing the barque's head round until her nose and that of the _Flying Fish_ pointed straight toward the rapidly narrowing passage between the bergs Then, indeed, the thin but tough hawser straightened out taut as a bow-string between the two vessels as the baronet sent his engines powerfully ahead; the barque's windlass bitts creaked and groaned with the tremendous strain to which they were suddenly subjected; a foaathered and hissed under her bows, and as her harassed crew, active as wild-cats, skipped about the decks busily letting go and clewing up, aent the two craft toward the closing gap
It was like steering into the jaws of death The two bergs were by this ti Fish's_ conical stem; and as they swept irresistibly onward, their pinnacled sued sides rasping horribly along the edges of the floe with an awful crushi+ng, grinding sound, and their contiguous sides approaching each other more and more nearly every moment, there was not a man on either of those two vessels who did not hold his breath and stand fascinated in awestricken suspense, gazing upon thosefor the shock which should be the herald of their destruction
Rapidly--yet slower than a snail's pace, as it seemed to those anxious s and the shi+ps; the grinding crash and crackle of the ice grewwind fros cut their faces like an invisible razor as it swept down upon theusts, apparently intent upon retarding their progress until the last hope of escape should be cut off; the gigantic icy cliffs lowered ly down upon the of doubt and suspense was at its highest, the _Flying Fish_ entered the gap The channel had by this ti Fish_ to pass through it seeh there remained scarcely room for the barque with hercrystal walls closed in upon them every man present felt that the final inald; if at this critical instant his nerve failed hi but quick destruction and a horrible death for every man there But the baronet's nerve did _not_ fail him With a face pale and teeth clenched with excite eye, he stood with one hand on the tiller and the other on the engine lever, guiding his shi+p exactly htthe ice on either side, he increased the pressure of his hand upon the lever, the engines revolved a shade h the narrowest part of the pass uninjured, but escaping by the et through? She was fully two hundred feet astern of the _Flying Fish_, and the bergs were revolving on their own centres in such a manner that ere ether with a force which would literally annihilate whatever ht happen to be between them And as for the barque--the way in which her boere burying theed about her cutwater, and the terrified looks of her crew as they glanced, now aloft at the for hawser--from which they stood warily aloof lest it should part, and in so doing inflict upon some of them a deadly injury--told the baronet that he le ounce the strain upon the rope, lest soive way on board the whaler and leave her there helpless in the very grip of those awful floating s and the barque; and Mild there by the after rail, told hiress of events, that the bergs would win The contiguous sides of these htly concave in shape; and whilst the whaler, still soe had a foot or two of clear water on either side of her, the projecting extres had neared each other to within a distance of twenty feet, or some five feet less than the breadth of the imprisoned shi+p
Suddenly a tre Fish_ looked to see the unfortunate barque collapse and crumple into a shapeless mass of splintered wood before their eyes But, to their inexpressible astonish sound as of muffled thunder, which echoed and re- echoed in the confined space between the two bergs; a series of tres recoiled violently fro else, threw the engine lever still further forward, and before anyone had time even to draw a breath of relief, the apparently dooe heaped up round her bows as high as the figurehead, out frole instant before the two gigantic ain closed in upon each other with a horrible grinding _crunch_ which must have been audible for ed, almost bows under, so and rasping bergs, that her creere able to realise the astounding fact of their safety, but when they did so they sent up a wild cheer which was as distinct an expression of gratitude to God for their deliverance as ever issued froh it could easily be accounted for, ht indeed well be called uished--apparently their last chance gone--two huge overhanging projections on the sus had codown into the water, fortunately at some few yards' distance astern of the whaler, and the shock of collision had been so great as to cos, with the fortunate result already described
Directly it was seen that the barque had indeed escaped, the _Flying Fish's_ engines were slowed down to their lowest speed, and the whaler, relieved of the enor strain upon her, once more floated on her normal water-lines The two craft were now in co between two and threeahead of thes in their vicinity, it is true, but with no ice at hand likely to cause them immediate peril The barque was towed to ard of all these, and then the baronet stopped the _Flying Fish_ altogether, and hailed the skipper of the whaler to knohither he was bound Upon this the worthy e consort to return thanks in person for his recent rescue
He was a very fine speci in his ht pilot jacket, sealskin cap, and water boots reaching to his thighs; and it was a Fish's_ side-ladder and stepped in upon her roo but the pilot-house The four companions of course stepped out on deck in a body to meet him, and after they had all heartily shaken hands with hily received his thanks for the important service rendered in the rescue of his shi+p from the ice, he was invited to accompany thelass of grog And if the worthy seae craft he was now visiting, how nificent saloons, revelled in their grateful warmth, and looked round bewildered upon the rich carpets, the handsome furniture, the superb pictures and statuary, and the choice _bric a brac_, all glowing under the brilliant but cunningly ht And if he was surprised at all these unwonted sights, his astonishined when he was informed that the four refined and cultured men elcomed him so hospitably, constituted, with the exception of the cook and the steward, the entire crew of the inificence he beheld had dared the terrors of the polar regions solely by way of pasti that tastes differ, and what you've just told h on to twenty-five years, but it has been a case of necessity, not choice, with me; and after the first two or three years of the life--when the novelty had worn off a bit, as you , and that is the scraping together of enough et quit of it all for ever I took to it first as a hand before the rades--boat- steerer, third, second, and chief mate, master, and at last owner of my own shi+p, alith the sao, I put the savings of a lifetiht that the dream of my life was soon to be realised, and that one tripme in a sufficiency to last me the remainder of my days, and enable hter God bless the child! if she's still alive she's five years old to-day”
”Ah!” interrupted Mild on board you, and the uess?”
”That's it, sir,” was the reply ”I 'dressed shi+p' at eight o'clock thisin honour of my little Florrie's birthday, and I hadn't the heart to haul down the flags even e found ourselves in such a precious pickle aht that if so be it was God's will that as to go, wein Florrie's honour as not”
”And what success have you inald
”Precious little, sir We've been out now more'n a twelvemonth, and we've only killed three fish in all that time Got jammed up here in the ice all last winter I stayed in hopes of doin' soot some three hundred skins after all It's been a bad speculation for me An old friend ofan open one and not much ice about, he reached as far north as Baffin's Bay and through Jones' Sound, fillin' his shi+p with oil and bone in a single season He was lucky enough to hit upon a spot where the sea was fairly alive hales, and he filled the shi+p right up in that very spot The fish seeh they hadn't been interfered with for years; and bein' an old friend, as I said before, he gave reat secret, and I've been trying to reach the spot ever since we came north, but have been kept back by the ice and the contrary winds If I could get there, even now, it would h to servedisheartened”
”Never mind, captain, cheer up; allyour shi+p _over_ the ice, but if there is only a passage for her we can drag her _through_ it, and for little Florrie's sake ill If it is in our power to get you to the spot you wish to reach, you shall go there Now, as the present open water affords an opportunity too good to be lost, return to your shi+p, secure our hawser in such a way that wethe vessel, and send a trustworthy hand aloft into the crow's-nest to look out for the best channels We will tow you to the northward as long as a channel can be found through the ice, and at seven o'clock I hope you will give us the pleasure of your company on board here to dinner, ill drink 'ne the _Flying Fish's_ cellar affords”
The captain of the whaler returned to his own shi+p in a state of such led astonishment and elation that his people were at first inclined to think he had suddenly gone deave the hawser in such a manner as would enable the shi+p to withstand a heavy strain was intelligible enough; it told thee rescuers, a supreme effort was now to be rounds which had froe; and that, best of all, that effort was to be unacco the shi+p to ard through the ice, and they set to with a will A sufficient length of the haas hauled on board to enable them to take a couple of turns round the barrel of the windlass and two more round the heel of the fore further secured by tackles to every ring-bolt in the shi+p capable of bearing a good substantial strain; and then, the skipper hiiven for the _Flying Fish_ to go ahead
CHAPTER TEN
THE ”HUMBOLDT” GLACIER
The two shi+ps were at this ti in a tolerably broad expanse of open water; but at a distance of some seven miles ahead the pack-ice stretched, apparently unbroken, across their track for miles The skipper of the whaler, however, shouted down to theence that a soh this ice in a northerly direction as far as the eye could reach Toward this channel, then, away they went at a speed of so like sixteen knots per hour, the barque with her string of colours still fluttering bravely in defiance of the adverse gale, and the _Flying Fish_ with the white ensign of the Royal Yacht Squadron, of which Sir Reginald was a n staff in honour of little Florrie It was a strange sight, even in that region of fantastic phantasoria, to see the two shi+ps, one of which,rapidly along through the black foam-flecked water, with ice in every conceivable fors fluttering against the dark and disround of a stormy sky; and the skipper of the whaler possesses to this day a spirited water-colour sketch of the scene, executed on the spot by the colonel, which he exhibits with beco pride whenever he relates the story of his wonderful escape fros
Half an hour later they entered the channel through the ice Narrow and tortuous at first, it gradually widened out, and, after a journey of some fourteen or fifteen miles, turned sharply off in a direction alale broke, the sun h the rifted clouds, and by seven o'clock that evening, at which hour Florrie's father duly put in an appearance on board the _Flying Fish_, the engines having been temporarily stopped to receive hiht channel some twelve miles in width and entirely free froht easterly wind blowing, and the evening sun lighting up the snow-clad peaks of the extensive island called North Devon An hour later, dinner having been postponed on account of their near proximity to the land, the two vessels entered a commodious natural harbour called Hyde Bay, and anchored there for the night, in order to give the whaler's exhausted crew an opportunity to snatch a few hours of much-needed rest
The master of the _Walrus_, who answered, by the way, to the nah only a bluff hearty seaman, and somewhat shy for the first half-hour or so in such unaccustomed company as that of his four well-bred easy-enial influence of the baronet's chane, and proved hireeable co anecdote and inforion his hosts were now visiting for the first time, and imparted to the themselves from the ice; but, as they did not see fit to inforhed to scorn their project of reaching the North Pole, which he assured them most solemnly was an utter impossibility They duly drank the unconscious Florrie's health, treated her father to soave hiht with thehly happy ht, whilst the party on board the _Flying Fish_ were sitting down to breakfast, the sound of oars was heard close alongside; and a e, reat hurry and almost breathlessly explained that he had come on board to repeat his thanks and those of his crew for their rescue of the previous day, and to say ”Good-bye,” as he was about to weigh and proceed to sea in chase of a large school of whales which had just been seen spouting at a distance of soood- natured enough to offer to tow hiratefully declined, saying that there was a fine fair wind blowing and that his anchor was already a-trip The party therefore shook hands heartily with hi Sir Reginald and his friends to finish theirFish_ also weighed and stood out to sea after the _Walrus_, now nearly hull down, to witness the sport
The engines had scarcely begun to move when the whaler was seen to heave to; and when the _Flying Fish_ ranged up alongside her, some ten minutes afterwards, three whale-boats were in the water and pulling lustily toward a school of so, apparently quite unconscious of danger, about two miles away
”Those whales do not appear in the least alarmed at the presence of the boats,” remarked Mildmay; ”evidently they have not been chased for a considerable period If we only had thea fehat a splendid opportunity there would be to do that poor fellow Hudson a good turn”
”Well thought of!” exclaientleood turn, and, at the sae-bore rifles with explosive shells for big game”