The World of Ice. R. M. Ballantyne

a curious fancy, Fred, but not unnatural."

      "Tom," said Fred after another long silence, "has not the thought occurred to you that God made it all?"

      "Some such thought did cross my mind, Fred, for a moment, but it soon passed away. Is it not very strange that the idea of the Creator is so seldom and so slightly connected with his works in our minds?"

      Again there was a long silence. Both youths had a desire to continue the conversation, and yet each felt an unaccountable reluctance to renew it. Neither of them distinctly understood that the natural heart is enmity against God, and that, until he is converted by the Holy Spirit, man neither loves to think of his Maker nor to speak of him.

      While they sat thus musing, a breeze dimmed the surface of the sea, and the Dolphin, which had hitherto lain motionless in one of the numerous canals, began slowly to advance between the islands of ice. The breeze freshened, and rendered it impossible to avoid an occasional collision with the floating masses; but the good ship was well armed for the fight, and, although she quivered under the blows, and once or twice recoiled, she pushed her way through the pack gallantly. In the course of an hour or two they were once more in comparatively clear water.

      Suddenly there came a cry from the crow's-nest—"There she blows!"

      Instantly every man in the ship sprang to his feet as if he had received an electric shock.

      "Where away?" shouted the captain.

      "On the lee-bow, sir," replied the look-out.

      From a state of comparative quiet and repose the ship was now thrown into a condition of the utmost animation, and, apparently, unmeaning, confusion. The sight of a whale acted on the spirits of the men like wild-fire.

      "There she blows!" sang out the man at the masthead again.

      "Are we keeping right for her?" asked the captain.

      "Keep her away a bit; steady!" replied the lookout.

      "Steady it is!" answered the man at the wheel.

      "Call all hands and get the boats out, Mr. Bolton," said the captain.

      "All hands ahoy!" shouted the mate in a tempestuous voice, while the men rushed to their respective stations.

      "Boat-steerers, get your boats ready."

      "Ay, ay, sir."

      "There go flukes," cried the look-out, as the whale dived and tossed its flukes—that is, its tail—in the air, not more than a mile on the lee-bow; "she's heading right for the ship."

      "Down with the helm!" roared the captain. "Mr. Bolton, brace up the mizzen-top-sail! Hoist and swing the boats! Lower away!"

      In another moment three boats struck the water, and their respective crews tumbled tumultuously into them. Fred and Singleton sprang into the stern-sheets of the captain's boat just as it pushed off, and, in less than five minutes, the three boats were bounding over the sea in the direction of the whale like race-horses. Every man did his best, and the tough oars bent like hoops as each boat's crew strove to outstrip the others.