Climbing miles up the heavy atmosphere, it is advanced to iceberg peaks, beyond and below the horizon. Visited thus only for ages, do they inclose the pole? Are they the goal we seek? Springing up the crystal shafts in warmth of welcome are reflected back again and beckon us on.
Our minds in sublime mood, to silence, are disturbed, as father suddenly jerks up his head. “It is the red fire of the north.” The rare mystery the superstitious ancients believed to be a sign of war is now solved, and the simple in fact is most beautiful of sight.
Our path is strangely smooth, as though some hitherto sea had congealed and left a frozen plain, which gives us grateful relief until our direction ceases and the last marked path stops, and an icy lobe rears high before us.
Clamp-spurring our wheels we climb its height, to find a table formation, level graded, an unmistakable sign of ice-locked land, as if an island included in the cold grasp that holds the sea. We do not go far, when a pile of ice rocks hem in a space. We proceed to inspect. Hastily curving by, we are suddenly brushed by a bush, and berries rattle lusciously on our window-pane. Flinging it open a balmy air salutes us, forcing us out upon a bright-hued snow-flower carpet.
“What, berries in spring! in Arctic forcing-houses! no cold night to delay matters!” as Charley is about to cram his mouth. But I, on closely examining, fail to identify them, and jot in my book a new name, “Onigogies.” He looks over to read. “Gogies, gogies, gorge us, please.”
“Tu whu a whu,” wavers our brains and quivers our eyes, as we see a great white owl perched on our banner, blinking. I see near by an apple vine. I reach out and take a most beautiful red specimen, before I am aware that it is already in the mouth of a serpent, coiled around the twig. Unconsciously an Eve, as unconscious, also, is the reptile, who looks at me with kind, appreciative eyes. But I drop the apple and get into the sleigh, quite weak, unable to prevent Mae from taking and eating another, giving one to father. Seeing me in, Charley gets ready to enter, by loading the bottom. The owl has gone, but approaching is a gorgeous stork of orange plumage. Of camel size, it coolly steps over us, as the rest quickly step in and we move forward.
Thinking this may be a lost Eden, I look curiously to discover the life tree, to see Mae and father, who have turned deathly pale, reel in their seats. Stopping quickly, we put snow on their heads and bind it by leaves of a high shrub we are under. Shuddering, they grasp the leaves in their teeth and swallow the juice as their breath revives. A red glow on their cheeks. Was it the leaves of healing? Much trampled beneath had given us roadway. As expected, we enter a herd of foxes, who are barking in play and basking in the unusual light; as all else, unnoticing us, we glide along quite securely.
Charley has studied the lesson of the apple, as he audaciously reaches down and takes one, and calmly eats it in conjunction with the leaves, to my perturbed attention.
We reach the edge of the island and go down to the sea plain again, which is here more rough in icy waves, making the travel quite difficult. The waves grew larger until mountains high, then lessen and gradually disappear, having unfolded to us a frozen storm at sea.
The surface is smoother and smoother; so that we start up swiftly. A gale scurries toward us from behind. As it strikes us Charley opens valves and we all rise in our seats, unable to contain our ardor, as miles are covered in our exceeding speed, which continues as the moments and hours pass, father’s speed-measure marking a mile a second. Hundreds of miles are covered and the ice is still smooth. Knowing we are not so far away from the peaks that point the pole, we hourly anticipate a view as of masts arising at sea, but instead, we are shocked to see the flame-hued sky settle densely in a fog. So long our friend, its warmth had melted the congealed air and now clouds our nautical bearings. Our compass is our sole northly guide. But what—what is the matter with it that it hangs its head and stops? We are lost!