world of ice and snow itself had taken
umbrage at Macnab's song, for, while we were yet in the act of
enthusiastically prolonging the last "sno-o-ow," there sounded in our
ears a loud report, as if of heavy artillery close at hand.

We all leaped up in excitement, as if an enemy were at our doors.

"There it goes at last!" cried Lumley, rushing out of the house followed
by Spooner.

I was about to follow when Macnab stopped me.

"Don't get excited, Max, there's no hurry!"

"It's the river going to break up," said I, looking back impatiently.

"Yes, I know that, but it won't break up to-night, depend on it."

I was too eager to wait for more, but ran to the banks of the river,
which at that place was fully a mile wide. The moon was bright, and we
could see the familiar sheet of ice as still and cold as we had seen it
every day for many months past.

"Macnab's right," said I, "there will be no breakup to-night."

"Not so sure of that," returned Lumley; "the weather has been very warm
of late; melting snow has been gushing into it in thousands of streams,
and the strain on the ice--six feet thick though it is--must be
tremendous."

He was checked by another crashing report; but again silence ensued, and
we heard no more till next morning. Of course we were all up and away
to the river bank long before breakfast, but it was not till after that
meal that the final burst-up occurred. It was preceded by many
reports--towards the end by what seemed quite a smart artillery fire.
The whole sheet of ice on the great river seemed to be rising bodily
upwards from the tremendous hydraulic pressure underneath. But though
the thaws of spring had converted much snow into floods of water, they
had not greatly affected the surface of the ice, which still lay hard
and solid in all its wintry strength.

A greater Power, however, was present. If the ice had been made of
cast-iron six feet in thickness, it must have succumbed sooner or later.

At last, as Macnab said, "She went!" but who shall describe _how_ she
went? It seemed as if the mighty cake had been suddenly struck from
below and shattered. Then the turmoil that ensued was grand and
terrible beyond conception. It was but an insignificant portion of
God's waters at which we gazed, but how overwhelming it seemed to us!
Mass rose upon mass of ice, the cold grey water bursting through and
over all, hurling morsels as large as the side of a house violently on
each ot