the northeast and moves towards the shore of Norway. They
were then in latitude 51 degrees 37 minutes, and longitude 22 degrees
37 minutes, two hundred miles from the end of Greenland. The weather
grew colder; the thermometer fell to 32 degrees, the freezing-point.

The doctor, without yet putting on his arctic winter dress, was
wearing a suit of sea-clothes, like all the officers and sailors; he
was an amusing sight in his high boots, in which he could not bend his
legs, his huge tarpaulin hat, his trousers and coat of the same
material; in heavy rain, or when the brig was shipping seas, the
doctor used to look like a sort of sea-monster, a comparison which
always flattered him.

[Illustration]

[Illustration]

For two days the sea was very rough; the wind veered to the northwest,
and delayed the _Forward_. From the 14th to the 16th of April there
was still a high sea running; but on Monday there fell a heavy shower
which almost immediately had the effect of calming the sea. Shandon
called the doctor's attention to it.

"Well," said the doctor, "that confirms the curious observations of
the whaler Scoresby, who was a member of the Royal Society of
Edinburgh, of which I have the honor to be a corresponding member. You
see that while the rain is falling the waves are hardly to be noticed,
even when the wind is strong. On the other hand, in dry weather the
sea would be rougher even with a gentler wind."

"But what is the explanation of it, Doctor?"

"It's very simple; there is no explanation."

At that moment the ice-master, who was on watch in the topmast
cross-trees, cried out that there was a floating mass on the starboard
quarter, about fifteen miles to windward.

[Illustration]

"An iceberg in these latitudes!" cried the doctor.

Shandon turned his glass in that direction, and corroborated the
lookout's words.

"That's strange," said the doctor.

"Are you surprised?" asked the commander, laughing. "What! are we
lucky enough to find anything that will surprise you?"

"I am surprised without being surprised," answered the doctor,
smiling, "since the brig _Ann Poole_, of Greenspond, was caught in the
ice in the year 1813, in the forty-fourth degree of north latitude,
and Dayement, her captain, saw hundreds of icebergs."

"Good," said Shandon; "you can still teach us a great deal about
them."

"O, not so very much!" answered Clawbonny, modestly, "except that ice
has been seen in very much lower lati