d in upon him and caused him to stand at bay. He looked at us
savagely, singling out one of us to attack, and then rushed upon David;
but the old whaler's lance was ready, and the bear received a mortal
thrust in his breast. Notwithstanding this, he rushed forward grinning
savagely; but David sprung out of his way, and another lance pierced him
to the heart.

We had thus secured some very valuable prizes, and we even hoped there
might be more of them below, provided they had not eaten up the stores
on which we counted. Not one liked to be the first to go down till we
had ascertained whether the cabin had any more occupants. At last none
appearing. Terence with cautious steps descended the ladder, ready to
spring up again should another bear show his face. Stepping over the
carcase of the bear, which lay at the foot of the ladder he looked in.
Presently he shouted to us to follow, and we all quickly descended,--
anxious to see what damage the bears had committed.

Fortunately all our stores had been returned to the lockers, and they
had broken open only one, and had got hold of a jar of brown sugar and
another of flour, which, in their clumsy endeavours to eat, they had
sprinkled about the cabin. We calculated from this that they had not
been there long; for if they had, they would have routed out everything
eatable they possibly could get on board.

As it was, our carelessness had been productive of more good than harm,
for the skins of the beasts would make us some warm clothing, while
their flesh would afford us food for a long time, if we could get no
other fresh meat.

Our first care was now to construct a number of hand sledges, for the
conveyance of our stores to our winter quarters. The small ones were
made so that one person could drag them over the smooth parts of the
ice; and on having to pass any rough portions, two or three persons
might tackle together, passing one sledge after the other.

To carry the woodwork for our house, we were obliged to form a large
sledge, which would require nearly all the party to drag it forward.
Taking care to close all the hatches, we loaded our sledges with
provisions, blankets, and some additional clothing, and set forward on
our return to the bay.

CHAPTER THIRTY TWO.

We travelled briskly along over the ice, our encounter with the bears
affording us abundant matter for amusement. I forgot to say, that not
having time to flay them, we had shoved them do