“Yes, ye will—dreffully sea-sick. Den you wants to call de steward plenty quick.”
One ice-anchor came on board; the other—the bow—was cut adrift as the ship’s stern swung round seaward. Almost at the same moment an explosion was heard close alongside, as if one of the boilers had burst. The great berg to which they had been anchored had parted company with the floe, and was evidently bent on going to sea along with the Arrandoon.
Once they were a little way clear of the ice they could look about them, the snow no longer blowing over the vessel. The scene was peculiar, and such as can only be viewed in Greenland under like circumstances.
The whole field of ice, as far as it was visible, was a smother of whirling drift; the lofty cone of Jan Mayen, which though miles to the south’ard and west, had been so well-defined an object against the blue of the sky, was now blurred and indistinct, and the grey, driving clouds every now and again quite hid the top of it from view. All along the edge of the pack the snow was being blown seaward like smoke, or like the white spray on the rocks where billows break. The eastern horizon was a chaos of dark, shifting billows, as tall as houses, and foam-tipped; but near by the ice, although the wind blew already with the force of a gale, and the surface of the water was churned into froth, there was not a wave bigger than you would see on a farmer’s mill-pond.
What a pity it seemed to leave this comparatively smooth water and steam away out into the centre of yonder mighty conflict ’twixt wind and wave. But well every one on board knew that to remain where they were was but to court destruction, for the noise that proceeded from the ice-fields told them the pack was breaking up. Ay, and bergs were already forging ahead of them, and surrounding them. Ere they were a mile from the floes they found this out, and the danger from the floating masses of ice was very real indeed. Every minute the pieces were hurtled with all the force of the waves against the sturdy vessel’s weather-side, threatening to stave her; nor could McBain, who never left the bridge until the vessel was well out to sea, avoid at times stemming the bergs that appeared ahead of him. For often two would present themselves at one time, and one must be stemmed—the smaller of the twain; for to have come in collision bow on, would have meant foundering.
But at length the danger was past as far as the ice was concerned, though now the seas were mountains high, and of Titanic force; so after an hour or two the Arrandoon lay to, and having seen the lights all properly placed, and extra hands put on the look-out—having, in fact, done everything a sailor could do for the safety of his ship, McBain came down below.
In shining oil-skins and dripping sou’-wester, he looked like some queer sea-monster that had just been caught and hauled on board.
He looked a trifle more human, however, when the steward had marched off with his outer garments.
“Is she snug?” asked Allan.
“Ay, lads, as snug as she is likely to be to-night,” replied McBain; “but she doesn’t like it, I can tell you, and the gale seems increasing to hurricane force. How is the glass, Rory?”