Crusoes of the Frozen North

by Gordon Stables

So off they set, Veevee and Briton bounding and barking in front, and Flossy waddling behind. Tom had his rifle and plenty of cartridges, but there was really nothing to shoot but the lovely gulls, and the boy was not so cruel as to touch one of these.

So they wandered on and on and upwards, until they came to a level spot all one lovely carpet of small wild flowers. Poppies of many colours grew here, mosses, yellow stone-crop, and grasses of every hue, but they agreed not to pick any until they should be returning. Still higher they went up the mountain-side, when suddenly little Pansy exclaimed: "Look, Tom! look, Ara! the sea is all flied away!"

Tom stared behind him and stood aghast.

A huge wall of fog or white mist had quite covered the ocean and even the shore, shutting them out from view, and was now slowly advancing towards them. But that was not the worst, for a low, moaning wind came on before it, and flakes of snow began to fall.

It was easy for Tom to say: "Let us get back at once to the beach, the boat must be there already." They had come miles from the bay. Before they could walk half the distance back, the snow-fog had swallowed them, and it was no wonder that they lost their way, and became cold and faint and dizzy.

Both Aralia and Pansy began to cry now, and at last sank down among the dry snow, unable to move another yard.

Tom was a boy of great courage. He thought for a little, and then he said: "Frank, if you can carry Pansy I'm sure I can manage Ara; and we will try to find shelter somewhere till the storm is blown over."

So on again in this way they struggled, till, more dead than alive, they found, by good luck, the welcome shelter of a cave. The cave was by no means large, but they were surprised to find it so warm. The first thing, however, that Tom did was to walk all round the inside, rifle in hand. Tom had not been two years at sea for nothing. Meanwhile, where was Flossy, and where was Briton?

Tom whistled again and again, till he said he had nearly whistled the whites of his eyes out, but never a dog replied.

Something else had begun to whistle also, and that was the wind, and although Tom made several attempts to leave the cave, to have a look at the weather as he called it, he found it impossible to stand. Hours and hours passed away like this, and the tempest seemed only to increase in force.