The Russian shook his head.
"We knew not that there were others in Nova Cania," he replied. "We were wrecked three weeks ago."
"Wrecked?" echoed Ranworth in unbelief. "Then how comes it that we found you so far inland?"
Petrovitch smiled feebly, for he was still very weak, although steadily regaining his vitality.
"There are other ways of being wrecked than on the seashore, monsieur," he said. "We were cast upon the barren land from an airship, in which we were making a scientific voyage. The blizzard brought us down like a stone. Pouf! In one second all was gone; our provisions, stores, instruments, in short, everything we possessed except what we stood upright in, although later on we recovered several things which had been blown far across the snow.
"We were stranded, and on the verge of starvation, sixty miles from the coast and without means of communicating with any wireless station."
"Without provisions—then how did you exist?" asked Ranworth,
"We found a tin of biscuits which had by a miracle escaped destruction," answered Ivan Petrovitch. "Two days later we fell in with a flock of seals. Then came the great blizzard."
"The same that played havoc with my brother's resources."
"Undoubtedly," agreed the Russian. "It was frightful. Even we Russians, accustomed to the cold, were on the point of death. Finally my friend Dmitri and I resolved to make a dash for the harbour you English call Desolation Inlet, hoping against hope to find a chance whaler anchoring there. For days we have eaten nothing but seals' flesh and pieces of rotten biscuit. Our comrades are in a worse plight, I fear."