int of Greenland.
The weather grew colder, and the thermometer descended to thirty-two
degrees, that is to say to freezing point.

The doctor had not yet begun to wear the garments he destined for
the Arctic Seas, but he had donned a sailor's dress like the rest;
he was a queer sight with his top-boots, in which his legs disappeared,
his vast oilcloth hat, his jacket and trousers of the same; when
drenched with heavy rains or enormous waves the doctor looked like
a sort of sea-animal, and was proud of the comparison.

During two days the sea was extremely rough; the wind veered round
to the north-west, and delayed the progress of the _Forward_. From
the 14th to the 16th of April the swell was great, but on the Monday
there came such a torrent of rain that the sea became calm immediately.
Shandon spoke to the doctor about this phenomenon.

"It confirms the curious observations of the whaler Scoresby, who
laid it before the Royal Society of Edinburgh, of which I have the
honour to be an honorary member. You see that when it rains the waves
are not very high, even under the influence of a violent wind, and
when the weather is dry the sea is more agitated, even when there
is less wind."

"But how is this phenomenon accounted for?"

"Very simply; it is not accounted for at all."

Just then the ice-master, who was keeping watch on the crossbars of
the topsails, signalled a floating mass on the starboard, at about
fifteen miles distance before the wind.

"An iceberg here!" cried the doctor.

Shandon pointed his telescope in the direction indicated, and
confirmed the pilot's announcement.

"That is curious!" said the doctor.

"What! you are astonished at last!" said the commander, laughing.

"I am surprised, but not astonished," answered the doctor, laughing;
"for the brig _Ann_, of Poole, from Greenspond, was caught in 1813
in perfect ice-fields, in the forty-fourth degree of north latitude,
and her captain, Dayernent, counted them by hundreds!"

"I see you can teach us something, even upon that subject."

"Very little," answered Clawbonny modestly; "it is only that ice has
been met with in even lower latitudes."

"I knew that already, doctor, for when I was cabinboy on board the
war-sloop _Fly_----"

"In 1818," continued the doctor, "at the end of March, almost in April,
you passed between two large islands of floating ice under the
forty-second degree of latitude."

"Well, I declare you astonish me!" cri