“Just so,” said the captain, hastening to the bow to direct the steersman. “Port your helm.”
“Steady.”
The brig was now about fifty yards from the neck of ice, tearing through the water like a race-horse. In another moment she was up to it and struck it fair in the middle. The stout little vessel quivered to her keel under the shock, but she did not recoil. She split the mass into fragments, and, bearing down all before her, sailed like a conqueror into the clear water beyond.
“Well done the Hope!” said the captain, as he walked aft, while a cheer burst from the men.
“I think she ought to be called the Good Hope ever after this,” said Tom Gregory. “If she cuts her way through everything as easily as she has cut through that neck of ice, we shall reach the North Pole itself before winter.”
“If we reach the North Pole at all,” observed Mr Dicey, “I’ll climb up to the top of it and stand on my head, I will!”
The second mate evidently had no expectation of reaching that mysterious pole, which men have so long and so often tried to find, in vain.
“Heavy ice ahead, sir,” shouted Mr Mansell, who was at the masthead with a telescope.
“Where away?”
“On the weather bow, sir, the pack seems open enough to push through, but the large bergs are numerous.”