creatures being near to carry off the strange
sensation.

He had just been passing through one of these fits; for it was evening,
and though broad daylight, with the sun shining, there was a peculiarity
in the sky to northward, a something he could not well have explained,
which made him feel that night was at hand. And as he leaned against
the side of the crow's-nest he listened to what was said on deck, and
then once more gazed to the northward, following the line of coast, and
then giving a start; for a few miles only from where they were gliding
onward he saw unmistakably that their journey in that direction was at
an end.

He carefully adjusted the glass so as to make sure, and found that it
was so: the icy barrier was jammed tight on to the land, and on
following it to the westward it extended in one solid wall right away
till it was lost in the distance.

Sweeping back to the coast, he searched carefully to see if there were
any opening or fiord by which they could pass onward; but there was not
a sign, and he was just about to announce his discovery, when he caught
sight of something about a mile away, standing out plainly on a low
headland, with the black face of a large cliff behind to throw it up so
clearly that he wondered why he had not seen it at the first.

Steve Young.

"At last!" he said, with his heart beating violently and a curious
choking sensation rising to his throat. For there, looking dim now as
he glanced through the glass once more, was a wooden cross, evidently
set up as a signal, the first trace of human occupation of that solemn,
solitary land; and it was some moments before his emotion would let him
hail the deck.

"Ahoy there!" he shouted; then exultantly, but in a tone of voice which
did not sound like his own, "Ice right ahead, and a signal showing about
a mile away!"

"What!" shouted Captain Marsham. "Stop a minute; I'll come up."

He ran to the shrouds, and began to climb rapidly and as actively as
either of the men till he was close beneath the great cask.

"Don't stir, my boy," he said; "I'll find room for both. Now then," he
continued, as the trap beneath their feet was closed, "where's the
signal?"

"Follow the coast-line for about a mile," cried Steve eagerly, as he
handed the glass, "and you will see a great black cliff with hardly a
scrap of snow upon it. Then, low down on a piece of level ground--"

"I have it!" cried the captain; "a large post." His tone o