The Argosy, Volume XLIV — page 136: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

132 Suddenly a great wave rose over the prow, and the ship shot forward and landed with a terrific splash in a very maelstrom of tossing billows! “ Good, the ice will not bear me down then,” Feltnar muttered. “ But the sea will fill the ship and will sink her quite as deep. Is there a chance for me after all, I wonder? ” The launching of the vessel had flung him down. But now he rose, clinging to the splintered door-frame. The cabin was still half full of ice, but it had jarred down at the door so that he was able to force his body through. He reached the open deck and glanced about. The waves still leaped all about the ship. But the water had run off her deck and washed much of the ice with it. The vessel was truly free! It seemed too wonderful to believe. It was indeed a miracle of God’s provi- dence. “Guess I haven’t deserved such luck,” thought the man, reeling with the pitch of the craft and reaching the bulwarks. His only thought was to spring upon some neighboring ice-cake, and thus, from cake to cake, to place a sufficient . distance between him and his uncertain refuge, so that when it sank he would not be drawn into the whirlpool. But no cakes of promising size were near, and he began to realize that the ship was taking her time in sinking. “Hope she'll hold me up a bit longer,” he muttered. He cast a long look around the hori- zon. ‘The sea was covered with the débris of the ice-field. Great masses of crystal were floating as far as he could see. He was near enough the Axar Fiord to see the shore and to recognize. several landmarks along the beach. But he had floated a long way from where the berg had been the day before. Suddenly he caught sight of an ob- ject upon an ice-floe which was several acres in extent. The object moved, and at first he thought it was a bear or seal. Then he saw that it stood too tall for either (unless the bear was on his hind legs), and he believed it to be a man. e OUgle THE ARGOSY. “Good heavens! I’m not the only fellow in hard luck. If I can reach that ice, I’ll have company anyway,” he thought. Then he glanced down again at the water. The boat had sunk no lower. “Is it really going to float? Can it be possible? ” he asked himself. He began pushing the ice still upon deck overboard. He worked hard at this for some minutes, and the longer he worked the higher his courage rose. “This 18 wonderful, if true!” he cried. “If this old ship holds together until I can get her ashore the gold will be saved.” But the ship was rocking violently in the trough of the waves. As it floated farther and farther from the berg, the force of the sea was more apparent. Ieltnar saw that he was by no means safe yet. If he could not keep the an- cient vessel’s head to the sea, she might be overturned and sunk after all. The situation was by no means en- viable despite the fact that he had al- ready escaped so much. CHAPTER XIV. AN OLD FRIEND AND AN OLD ENEMY. THE American was no seaman, and he felt his deficiencies in that line now most keenly. He ran about the deck with little idea as to what should be done to keep the vessel on a compara- tively even keel, now that she seemed inclined to remain on top of the water instead of diving under it. And while his mind was so perturbed, he was all the time approaching nearer that field of ice on which he had ob- served the other castaway. But he did not know this. He was looking out to sea. Suddenly a hail came to his ears. It awoke him to the presence of that other man. He ran to the rail nearest the ice, and was astonished to see how close the field was. “Stand ready to give me a hand, mate!” ‘cried the man in English. The words and tone well-nigh over- whelmed Feltnar. He gazed at the fel- low fixedly. COMRRIC LOO COL