seemed perfectly familiar
with all the ways on shipboard. He had evidently been to sea before.

It is hence easy to understand the boatswain's answer to Clifton's
friend, and how this idea found but few sceptics; more than one would
repeat it jestingly, who was fully prepared to see the dog, some fine
day, take human shape, and with a loud voice assume command.

If Richard Shandon did not share such apprehensions, he was far from
being undisturbed, and on the eve of departing, on the night of April
5th, he was talking on this subject with the doctor, Wall, and
Johnson, in the mess-room.

These four persons were sipping their tenth grog, which was probably
their last, too; for, in accordance with the letter from Aberdeen, all
the crew, from the captain to the stoker, were teetotalers, never
touching beer, wine, nor spirits, except in case of sickness, and by
the advice of the doctor.

For an hour past they had been talking about their departure. If the
captain's instructions were to be completely carried out, Shandon
would the next day receive a letter containing his last orders.

"If that letter," said the mate, "doesn't tell me the captain's name,
it must at least tell us whither we are bound. If not, in what
direction shall we sail?"

"Upon my word," answered the impatient doctor, "if I were in your
place, Shandon, I should set sail even without getting a letter; one
will come after us, you may be sure."

"You have a great deal of faith, Doctor. But, if you please, to what
part of the world would you sail?"

"Towards the North Pole, of course; there can be no doubt about that."

"No doubt indeed!" said Wall. "Why not towards the South Pole?"

"The South Pole! Never!" cried the doctor. "Would the captain ever
have thought of sending a brig across the whole Atlantic Ocean? Just
think for a moment, my dear Wall."

"The doctor has an answer for everything," was his only reply.

"Granted it's northward," resumed Shandon. "But tell me, Doctor, is it
to Spitzbergen, Greenland, or Labrador that we have to sail, or to
Hudson's Bay? If all these routes come to the same end at last,--the
impassable ice,--there is still a great number of them, and I should
find it very hard to choose between them. Have any definite answer to
that, Doctor?"

"No," answered the doctor, annoyed that he had nothing to say; "but if
you get no letter, what shall you do?"

"I shall do nothing; I shall wait."

"You won't set sail!" cri