“Inevitable,” said Stevenson, solemnly but emphatically. “We are doomed to perish here among this ice. There can be no rescue for us but through the grave.”
“We are in the hands of a merciful and an all-powerful Providence, Mr Stevenson,” said McBain; “we must trust, and wait, and hope, and do our duty.”
“That we will, sir, at all events,” said the mate; “but see, sir, what is that yonder?”
He pointed, as he spoke, skywards, and there, just a little way above the highest mountain-tops, was a cloud. It kept increasing almost momentarily, and got darker and darker. Both watched it until the sun itself was overcast, then the mate ran below to look at the glass. It was “tumbling” down.
For three days a gale and storm, accompanied with soft, half-wet snow, raged. Then terrible noises and reports were heard all over the pack of ice seaward, and the grinding and din that never fails to announce the break-up of the sea of ice.
“Heaven has not forgotten us,” cried McBain, hopefully; “this change will assuredly check the sickness, and perhaps in a week’s time we will be sailing southwards through the blue, open sea, bound for our native shores.”
McBain was right; the hopes raised in the hearts of the men did check the progress of the sickness. When at last the wind fell, they were glad to see that the clouds still remained, and that there were no signs of the frost coming on again.
The pieces of ice, too, were loose, and all hands were set to work to warp the ship southwards through the bergs. The work was hard, and the progress made scarcely a mile a day at first. But they were men working for their lives, with new-born hope in their hearts, so they heeded not the fatigue, and after a fortnight’s toil they found the water so much more open that by going ahead at full speed in every clear space, a fair day’s distance was got over. For a week more they strove and struggled onwards; the men, however, were getting weaker and weaker for want of sufficient food. How great was their joy, then, when one morning the island was sighted on which McBain had left the store of provisions!
Boats were sent away as soon as they came within a mile of the place.
Sad, indeed, was the news with which Stevenson, who was in charge, returned. The bears had made an attack on the buried stores. They had clawed the great cask open, and had devoured or destroyed everything.