arks" of the southeasterly drift of the
ship, the extreme cold (which, with the continuance of the bad weather,
prevented saving the wreck for jury-masts), and the fact that no sails
were sighted.

June 6th told of her being locked in soft, slushy ice, and still being
pressed southward by the never-ending gale; June 10th said that the ice
was hard, and at June 15th was the terrible entry: "Fire in the hold!"

On June 16th was entered this: "Kept hatches battened down and stopped
all air-holes, but the deck is too hot to stand on, and getting hotter.
Crew insist on lowering the boats and pulling them northward over the
ice to open water in hopes of being picked up. Good-bye." In the
position columns of this date the latitude was given as 62 degrees 44
minutes S. and the longitude as 30 degrees 50 minutes E. There were no
more entries.

"What tragedy docs this tell of?" said the doctor. "They left this
ship in the ice fifty years ago. Who can tell if they were saved?"

"Who indeed?" said Boston. "The mate hadn't much hope. He said
'Good-bye.' But one thing is certain; we are the first to board her
since. I take it she stayed down there in the ice until she drifted
around the Pole, and thawed out where she could catch the Cape Horn
current, which took her up to the Hope. Then she came up with the
South African Current till she got into the Equatorial drift, then
west, and up with the Guiana Current into the Caribbean Sea to the
southward of us, and this morning the flood-tide brought her through.
It isn't a question of winds; they're too variable. It's currents,
though it may have taken her years to get here. But the surprising
part of it is that she hasn't been boarded. Let's look in the hold and
see what the fire has done."

When they boarded the hulk, the sky, with the exception of a filmy haze
overhanging the eastern end of the island, was clear. Now, as they
emerged from the cabin, this haze had solidified and was coming--one of
the black and vicious squalls of the West India seas.

"No man can tell what wind there is in them," remarked Boston, as he
viewed it. "But it's pretty close to the water, and dropping rain.
Hold on, there, Doc. Stay aboard. We couldn't pull ashore in the
teeth of it." The doctor had made a spasmodic leap to the rail. "If
the chains were shackled on, we might drop one of the hooks and hold
her; but it's two hours work for a full crew."

"But we're likely to be blown