A strange transformation in the icy scene before them was taking place. A series of low, crackling sounds were succeeded by loud echoes like the reports of a cannon.
Beyond the ship, immense icebergs, the moment before fixed to the landscape, suddenly trembled, toppled and fell.
As they did so, all the eastern expanse seemed to melt into a white, rushing sea, moved to and fro in gigantic waves, as if by a mighty tempest.
“The ship! She is lost!” cried the appalled Will.
The iceberg near which the Arctic was moored at that moment parted as if cleft in twain.
Amid the falling mass of shattered ice and snow, the ship was temporarily shut out from view.
“Look—the sailors!”
It was Tom who spoke, and, as his companions followed the direction of his extended finger, they discerned several forms hurrying over the ice towards the ship.
“Jack and Hugo must be still with the sled,” said Will, anxiously. “Come, boys; we must find them and endeavor to regain the ship.”
They climbed down and hastened over the uneven ice towards the spot where they had left the sled.