o run and had not
moved.

"Good-morning!" greeted the older man a moment later, when they were
within speaking distance.

"Good-morning, sir," said Bobby, timidly.

"We thought you were an Eskimo, and" laughing, "the men apparently
thought you were a ghost. You gave them a fine fright."

"I didn't mean to frighten them," said Bobby apologetically.
"I only wanted them to take me off the ice."

[Illustration: "I was hunting," explained Bobby. "The ice broke loose
and cut Jimmy and me off from Skipper Ed"]

"Take you off the ice? Why, how did you get on it? We thought perhaps
you were hunting."

"I was hunting," explained Bobby, "but now I'm adrift. I'm Bobby
Zachariah, from Abel's Bay. The ice broke loose and cut Jimmy and me
off from Skipper Ed, and Jimmy's drowned--"

Tears came into Bobby's eyes and he choked at the recollection.

"I'm Frederick Winslow," said the man kindly and sympathetically, taking
Bobby's hand, "and this is my nephew Edward Norman. We do not know where
Abel's Bay is, nor who Skipper Ed and Jimmy are, but we're glad we found
you, and you're to go with us to the ship, and then you can tell us
about it, and there'll be a way to send you home to Abel's Bay."

"Edward Norman!" exclaimed Bobby. "Why, that's Skipper Ed's name!"

"Who is Skipper Ed?" inquired Mr. Winslow. "But never mind. Don't
explain now. You must be nearly starved if you've been adrift long. Come
with us."

"I've been over a week--nearly two weeks, I think," said Bobby, "but I'm
not hungry. I've had plenty of seals. Let me get my snow knife, sir.
It's in the _igloo_."

Then they went with Bobby and marveled at his _igloo_, and his crude
lamp, which they must have as a souvenir, and that Bobby had not
perished. And praised him for a brave lad, as they led him off. And
Bobby, who saw nothing wonderful or strange in his _igloo_ or lamp, or
anything he had done, said little, but followed timidly. And when the
men he had frightened so badly learned that Bobby was a castaway and a
very real person and not a ghost at all, they vied with one another in
showering kindnesses upon him, for these men of the fleets, though a bit
rough, and a bit superstitious at times, have big brave hearts, filled
with sympathy for their kind.

And so it came about that Bobby, who had come to the Coast a drifting
waif of the sea, was carried from it by the sea. And now he was to see
the land of strange trees and flowers and green fields of which