Part 14 (2/2)

”Los.h.!.+” cried Sandy, the surgeon, looking curiously overboard, ”what's this noo? Wonders will never cease!”

”Och, sure!” replied Rory, mischievously, ”you know well enough what it is; it's only speaking for speaking's sake you are.”

”The ne'er a bone o' ma knows, I do a.s.sure ye,” said Sandy.

”Well, doctor dear,” said Rory, ”it is simply the belt, or zone, that geographers call the 'Arctic circle.'”

But Sandy looked at him with a pitying smile. ”Man--Rory?” he said, ”I'm no' so sea-green as you tak me to be. I've a right good mind to pu' your lugs. Young men, sir, dinna enter Aberdeen University stirks and come out cuddies?”

”Mon!” cried Rory, imitating Sandy's brogue, ”if ye want to pu' my lugs you'll hae to catch me first;” and off he went round the deck, with the doctor after him. But Ralph caught him, if Sandy couldn't, and handed him over to justice.

”Now,” cried the surgeon, catching him by the ear, ”whistle, and I'll let you free.”

It is no easy matter to whistle when you want to laugh, but when Rory at long last did manage to emit a l.a.b.i.al note that pa.s.sed muster as a whistle, the doctor was as good as his word, and Rory was free.

Luncheon was barely finished, when down from the crow's-nest rang the welcome hail, ”Ice ahead!”

Our heroes rushed on deck, McBain was there before them, and when they stepped on to the ”lid” of the s.h.i.+p, as Sandy once called the deck, they found the captain half-way up to the nest.

There wasn't a bit of ice to be seen from the deck.

”Hurrah for the foretop?” cried Rory, laying hold of a stay. ”Who's coming?”

”I will!” cried Allan.

”I'm going below to finish lunch,” said Ralph.

”I'll be safer on deck, I think,” said the canny doctor.

But when Rory on the foretop struck an att.i.tude of wonderment, and pointing away ahead, exclaimed, in rapture, ”Oh, boys, what a scene is here!” the doctor thought he would give anything for a peep, so he summoned up his courage and began to ascend the rigging, slowly, and with about as much grace in his actions as a mud turtle would exhibit under the like circ.u.mstances.

Allan roared, ”Good doctor! good! Bravo, old man! Heave round like a brick! Don't look down.”

Rory was in a fit of merriment, and trying to stifle himself with his handkerchief. Suddenly down dropped that handkerchief; and this was just the signal four active lads were waiting for. Up they sprang like monkeys behind the surgeon, who had hardly reached the lubber-hole.

Alas! the good medico didn't reach it that day, for before you could have said ”cutla.s.s” he was seized, hand and foot, and lashed to the rigging, Saint Andrew's-cross fas.h.i.+on.

The surgeon of the _Arrandoon_ was spread-eagled, and Rory, the wicked boy! had his revenge.

”My conscience!” cried Sandy; ”what next, I wonder?”

”It's a vera judeecious arrangement,” sung Rory from the top.

But the men were not hard on the worthy doctor, and the promise of several ounces of n.i.g.g.e.r-head procured him his freedom, and he soon regained the deck, a sadder and a wiser man.

They were quickly among the ice--not bergs, mind you, only a stream of bits and pieces, of every shape and form, some like sheep and some like swans, and some like great white oxen. Here was a piece like a milking-pail; here was a lump like a hay-c.o.c.k; yonder a gondola; yonder a boat; and yonder a couch on which the Naiades might recline and float, or Ino slumber.

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