In a few moments, the sky was clear to the extreme verge of the horizon, and the sea reappeared, illumined by the oblique rays of the sun, which now rose only a few degrees above it. A rolling swell of the waves bathed the base of our iceberg in white foam, as it drifted, together with a great multitude of floating mountains under the double action of wind and current, on a course inclining to the nor’-nor’-east.
“Land!”
This cry came from the summit of the moving mountain, and Dirk Peters was revealed to our sight, standing on the outermost block, his hand stretched towards the north.
The half-breed was not mistaken. The land this time—yes!—it was land! Its distant heights, of a blackish hue, rose within three or four miles of us.
86° 12ʹ south latitude.
114° 17ʹ east longitude.
The iceberg was nearly four degrees beyond the antarctic pole, and from the western longitudes that our schooner had followed tracing the course of the Jane, we had passed into the eastern longitudes.
CHAPTER XXII.
IN CAMP.
A little after noon, the iceberg was within a mile of the land.
After their dinner, the crew climbed up to the topmost block, on which Dirk Peters was stationed. On our approach the half-breed descended the opposite slope, and when I reached the top he was no longer to be seen.
The land on the north evidently formed a continent or island of considerable extent. On the west there was a sharply projecting cape, surmounted by a sloping height which resembled an enormous seal’s head on the side view; then beyond that was a wide stretch of sea. On the east the land was prolonged out of sight.