It was now past noon, and the sun’s rays were warm, although the quantity of ice around rendered the air cold. As the men were returning from fixing the anchors, the captain looked over the side, and said:

“It’s not likely that we shall move out of this for some hours. What say you, lads, to a game of football?”

The proposal was received with a loud cheer. The ball had been prepared by the sail-maker, in expectation of some such opportunity as this. It was at once tossed over the side; those men who were not already on the field scrambled out of the brig, and the entire crew went leaping and yelling over the ice with the wild delight of schoolboys let loose for an unexpected holiday.

They were in the middle of the game when a loud shout came from the brig, and the captain’s voice was heard singing out:

“All hands ahoy! come aboard. Look alive!”

Instantly the men turned, and there was a general race toward the brig, which lay nearly a quarter of a mile distant from them.

In summer, changes in the motions of the ice take place in the most unexpected manner. Currents in the ocean are, no doubt, the chief cause of these; the action of winds has also something to do with them. One of these changes was now taking place. Almost before the men got on board the ice had separated, and long canals of water were seen opening up here and there. Soon after that a light breeze sprang up, the ice-anchors were taken aboard, the sails trimmed, and soon the Hope was again making her way slowly but steadily to the north.

Chapter Four Difficulties, Troubles, And Dangers

For some hours the brig proceeded onward with a freshening breeze, winding and turning in order to avoid the lumps of ice. Many of the smaller pieces were not worth turning out of the way of, the mere weight of the vessel being sufficient to push them aside.

Up to this time they had succeeded in steering clear of everything without getting a thump; but they got one at last, which astonished those among the crew who had not been in the ice before. The captain, Gregory, and Dicey were seated in the cabin at the time taking tea. Ned Dawkins, the steward, an active little man, was bringing in a tea-pot with a second supply of tea. In his left hand he carried a tray of biscuit. The captain sat at the head of the table, Dicey at the foot, and the doctor at the side.

Suddenly a tremendous shock was felt! The captain’s cup of tea leaped away from him and flooded the centre of the table. The doctor’s cup was empty; he seized the table with both hands and remained steady; but Dicey’s cup happened to be at his lips at the moment, and was quite full. The effect on him was unfortunate. He was thrown violently on his back, and the tea poured over his face and drenched his hair as he lay sprawling on the floor. The steward saved himself by dropping the bread-tray and grasping the handle of the cabin door. So violent was the shock that the ship’s bell was set a-ringing.

“Beg pardon, gentlemen,” cried the first mate, looking down the skylight. “I forgot to warn you. The ice is getting rather thick around us, and I had to charge a lump of it.”

“It’s all very well to beg pardon,” said the captain, “but that won’t mend my crockery!”

“Or dry my head,” growled Mr Dicey; “it’s as bad as if I’d been dipped overboard, it is.”

Before Mr Dicey’s grumbling remarks were finished all three of them had reached the deck. The wind had freshened considerably, and the brig was rushing in a somewhat alarming manner among the floes. It required the most careful attention to prevent her striking heavily.

“If it goes on like this, we shall have to reduce sail,” observed the captain. “See, there is a neck of ice ahead that will stop us.”

This seemed to be probable, for the lane of water along which they were steering was, just ahead of them, stopped by a neck of ice that connected two floe-pieces. The water beyond was pretty free from ice, but this neck or mass seemed so thick that it became a question whether they should venture to charge it or shorten sail.

“Stand by the fore- and main-topsail braces!” shouted the captain.

“Aye, aye, sir!”

“Now, Mr Mansell,” said he, with a smile, “we have come to our first real difficulty. What do you advise; shall we back the topsails, or try what our little Hope is made of, and charge the enemy?”

“Charge!” answered the mate.

“Just so,” said the captain, hastening to the bow to direct the steersman. “Port your helm.”

“Steady.”

The brig was now about fifty yards from the neck of ice, tearing through the water like a race-horse. In another moment she was up to it and struck it fair in the middle. The stout little vessel quivered to her keel under the shock, but she did not recoil. She split the mass into fragments, and, bearing down all before her, sailed like a conqueror into the clear water beyond.

“Well done the Hope!” said the captain, as he walked aft, while a cheer burst from the men.

“I think she ought to be called the Good Hope ever after this,” said Tom Gregory. “If she cuts her way through everything as easily as she has cut through that neck of ice, we shall reach the North Pole itself before winter.”

“If we reach the North Pole at all,” observed Mr Dicey, “I’ll climb up to the top of it and stand on my head, I will!”

The second mate evidently had no expectation of reaching that mysterious pole, which men have so long and so often tried to find, in vain.

“Heavy ice ahead, sir,” shouted Mr Mansell, who was at the masthead with a telescope.

“Where away?”

“On the weather bow, sir, the pack seems open enough to push through, but the large bergs are numerous.”

The Hope was now indeed getting into the heart of those icy regions where ships are in constant danger from the floating masses that come down with the ocean-currents from the far north. In sailing along she was often obliged to run with great violence against lumps so large that they caused her whole frame to tremble, stout though it was. “Shall we smash the lump, or will it stave in our bows?” was a question that frequently ran in the captain’s mind. Sometimes ice closed round her and squeezed the sides so that her beams cracked. At other times, when a large field was holding her fast, the smaller pieces would grind and rasp against her as they went past, until the crew fancied the whole of the outer sheathing of planks had been scraped off. Often she had to press close to ice-bergs of great size, and more than once a lump as large as a good-sized house fell off the ice-fields and plunged into the sea close to her side, causing her to rock violently on the waves that were raised by it.

Indeed the bergs are dangerous neighbours, not only from this cause, but also on account of their turning upside down at times, and even falling to pieces, so that Captain Harvey always kept well out of their way when he could; but this was not always possible. The little brig had a narrow escape one day from the falling of a berg.

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