ear go off--with such a crack too! I only wish I'd been able to hold
up for two seconds longer to see it properly, but my shelf went down,
and I had to go along with it. Blown to bits! No--he was blown to a
thousand atoms! Count 'em if you can."

Again Benjy burst into uproarious laughter.

There was indeed some ground for the boy's way of putting the case. The
colossal creature had been so terribly shattered by the dynamite
cartridge, that there was scarcely a piece of him larger than a man's
hand left to tell the tale.

"Well, well," said the Captain, assisting his son to rise, "I'm thankful
it's no worse."

"Worse, father! why, it _couldn't_ be worse, unless, indeed, his spirit
were brought alive again and allowed to contemplate the humbling
condition of his body."

"I don't refer to the bear, Benjy, but to yourself, lad. You might have
been killed, you know, and I'm very thankful you were not--though you
half-deserve to be. But come, we must encamp here for the night and
return home to-morrow, for the wind has been shifting a little, and will
be favourable, I think, in the morning."

The wind was indeed favourable next morning, we may say almost too
favourable, for it blew a stiff breeze from the south, which steadily
increased to a gale during the day. Afterwards the sky became overcast
and the darkness intense, rendering it necessary to attend to the kite's
regulator with the utmost care, and advance with the greatest caution.

Now, while the Captain and his friends were struggling back to their
Polar home, Leo Vandervell happened to be caught by the same gale when
out hunting. Being of a bold, sanguine, and somewhat reckless
disposition, this Nimrod of the party paid little attention to the
weather until it became difficult to walk and next to impossible to see.
Then, having shot nothing that day, he turned towards the Pole with a
feeling of disappointment.

But when the gale increased so that he could hardly face it, and the sky
became obliterated by falling and drifting snow, disappointment gave
place to anxiety, and he soon realised the fact that he had lost his
direction. To advance in such circumstances was out of the question, he
therefore set about building a miniature hut of snow. Being by that
time expert at such masonry, he soon erected a dome-shaped shelter, in
which he sat down on his empty game-bag after closing the entrance with
a block of hard snow.

The position of our hunter