r a week of travel, when no interruptions had occurred
by reason of accidents, old Andy came up on deck, and sniffing the air,
said:

"We'll sight ice before night, or I'm a Dutchman."

"What makes you think so?" asked Jack.

"I can smell it," replied the hunter, whereat Jack, and Mark who had
joined him, laughed.

"That is no joke," put in Professor Henderson, who, coming up the
companionway heard what was said. "Old sea captains will tell you they
can smell an iceberg long before they can see it."

"I don't claim to be a sea captain," said Andy, "but I once was on a
whaling voyage and I learned to sniff ice in the air. I saved the ship
from collision with a berg once."

"Let me see," began the inventor as the adventurers sat about the supper
table after the meal was finished, "who have the watches on deck
to-night?"

"Washington first and Bill second," replied Jack looking at the chart.

"Keep a sharp watch for the icebergs," advised the captain. "If you feel
a sudden chill in the air, and see something white, stop the engine at
once and call for me."

When the _Porpoise_ had been put in shape for the night, and the
company, tired out from their labors over a general "house cleaning"
which Captain Henderson had insisted on, went to bed, Washington took
his place in the conning tower.

It was quite cold, but as the temperature for several days past had been
steadily falling, nothing was thought of it.

"I guess I'll git out my fur-lined sealskin coat," said the colored man
to himself as he felt the chill night air, that seemed to increase in
frigidity along about eleven o'clock. He went to the cabin to get his
overcoat, and, returning on deck prepared to spend the rest of his hour
of watch in ease and comfort. He stretched out on the bench in the
conning tower, noted that the machinery was working right and that the
proper course was being steered, and then he let his thoughts drift to
the many adventures he and his employer had gone through of late, and
also while on the trip "Through the Air to the North Pole."

Washington gave one frightened, startled look, in a few minutes, so
comfortable had he fixed himself, but happening to look forward through
the glass-covered porthole of the tower, he saw something that made the
cold chills run down his back.

There, right in front of the _Porpoise_, and not a cable-length away was
a tall, mysterious, white thing which was shimmering in the pale light
of the