The Cruise of the Snowbird: A Story of Arctic Adventure
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by science, they cannot do everything. Hannibal, when hecrossed the Alps, did _not_ melt the rocks with vinegar. Science alonecan aid us in reaching the Pole. Sledges we need, balloons are needed,and last, but not least, a ship with _steam_."
"I entirely concur with you," said McBain. "What say you, boys?"
"I think the mate of the _Trefoil_ is right," said Ralph and Allan.
"'Tis not in mortals to command success," said Rory; "but I think we'vedone rather more--we've deserved it."
"Well said," cried Allan.
"Yes, well said," added McBain; "and, after all, who shall say that wemay not return to these seas again. None of us are very old, andwonders never cease. Why, I do declare that bold Magnus here looksfully ten years younger with the good the cruise has done him?"
"Ha! ha! ha!" laughed the weird old man, gathering up that chart thatseemed so sacred a thing in his eyes; "and if ever you do, and old manMagnus is still alive, and has one leg left to hop upon, if it's only awooden one, he'll trust to sail with you for the land he loves so well."
"The land we all love so well," said McBain; "the seas to which no oneever yet sailed without wishing to revisit them."
There was a faint double knock at the saloon door as the captain ceasedspeaking, and Mitchell entered.
"Well, Mr Mitchell, come in, but not so doubtingly; we have donetalking, and have come to the unanimous conclusion that the time hasarrived for us to bear up."
"Hurrah! to that," said Mitchell, striking his left palm with his rightfist in a very solid manner indeed.
"And now, sir," continued Mitchell, "I come to tell you that quite awall of mist is rolling down upon us from the nor'-east. It is as closeand black as factory smoke, and it is now close aboard of us."
"Any wind?"
"Not much, sir, but what little there is is coming down along with themist."
"Then fill the foreyard, Mr Mitchell. Set every stitch she'll bear,studding-sails if you like, so long as it isn't too dark and close, andthe bergs are anything like visible. I'll be on deck myself presently."
"Well, Rory," said Captain McBain, entering the snuggery that samenight, rubbing his hands and beaming with smiles, "so we have borne upat last; how do you like the idea of returning to your native land afterall your long journeyings and wild adventures?"
"Indeed, I like it immensely," replied Rory, "barring the differencethat it isn't my native land I'll be going to after all, but the land o'the mountain and the flood. Oh! won't I be happy to meet Allan's dearmother and sister again! And even Janet, the dear old soul!"
"Well," said McBain, taking up Rory's fiddle and thoughtfully bringingsome very discordant notes out of it, "I sincerely hope they will be allalive to meet us: if the meeting be all right I don't fear for thegreeting." Then brightening up and putting down the instrument, hecontinued, "I've been leaning over the bows for the last hour, andthinking, and I've come to the conclusion that we haven't done so badlyby our cruise after all."
"We haven't filled up with ivory from the mammoth caves though," saidRalph, with a sigh.
"Why that plaintive sigh, poor soul?" asked Rory.
"Ah! because, you know," replied Ralph, pinching Rory's ear, "we haven'tmade wealth untold, and I'll have to marry my grandmother after all."
"Oh!" cried McBain, "your somewhat antiquated cousin; I had forgottenall about her."
"I hadn't," said Ralph.
"Never mind," said Rory, "something may turn up, and even if the worstcomes to the worst, I'll be at the wedding, and play the Dead March inSaul."
"Ah!" said Ralph, "it is just as well for you that you moved out of myreach, you saucy boy?"
"There are two thousand pounds to a share," continued McBain, "if wesell our furs and oils only indifferently well."
"And sure," said Rory, "even that is better than a stone behind the ear.And look at all the fun we have had, and all the adventures; troth,we'll have stories to tell all our lives, if we never go to sea anymore, and live till we're as old as the big hill o' Howth."
"But I think, you know, boys," McBain went on, "we have gained a dealmore than the simple pecuniary value of what lies in our tanks andlockers. Increased health and strength, for instance."
"Ah?" added Allan, "strength of mind as well as body, for, positively,before I left Glentroom, I did little else but mope--now, I think Iwon't do anything of the kind again. With the little capital I haveobtained, I will begin and cultivate my glen--it is worth more thanrabbits' food."
"Yes," said McBain, "there is gold in the glen."
"Speaking figuratively, yes."
"It only needs perseverance to make it yield it. What a grand thingthat perseverance is! I think, boys, we've learned a little of itsvirtue, even in this cruise of ours, though we haven't done everythingwe had hoped. But perseverance builds names and fortunes--it buildscities too."
"It builds continents," said Rory, looking very wise--for him; "justlook what a midge of a creature the coral zoophyte is, but look at thework it is doing every day, the worlds it is throwing up almost, forfuture millions to inhabit."
Thus continued our heroes talking till long past midnight; and evenafter they had retired, one at least did not fall all at once asleep.That one was Allan. He began to believe that his dreams of restoringhis dear old roof-tree, Arrandoon Castle, would yet be realised. That atime would soon come when his mother and sister would sit in halls asnoble as any his forefathers had occupied, and mingle among a peasantryas happy and content as they were in the good old years of long, longago. Perseverance would do it; and, happy thought, he would adopt a newbadge, and it would neither be a flower, nor a fern, nor a feather, butsimply a piece of coral. Then presently he found himself deep down inthe green translucent waters of the Indian Ocean, in a cave, in a coralisle, conversing with a mermaid as freely as if it were the most naturalthing in all the world; then he awoke, and behold it was broad daylight.
At least it was just as broad daylight as it was likely to be, while thegood yacht was still enveloped in the bosom of that dense mist.
The _Snowbird_ evidently did not think herself the best used yacht inthe world. They would not give her sail enough to let her fly along asshe wanted to, and, more than that, she was constantly being checked bythe pieces of ice that struck and hammered at her on both bow andquarter. Sometimes she seemed to lose her temper and stop almost deadstill, as much as to say, "I do think such treatment most ungratefulafter all I've gone through, and, if it continues, I declare I won't goanother step of my toe towards home."
Ah! but when a week passed away, and when all at once the yacht sailedout from this dark and pitiless mist, and found herself in a bluerippling sea, with a blue and cloudless sky overhead, and never a bit ofice to be seen, then she _did_ regain her temper.
"Well," she said, "this _is_ nice, this is perfectly jolly; now for atrifle more sail, and won't I go rolling home!"
Sunlight seemed to bring joy to every heart. Our heroes walked the deckarrayed in their best, walked erect with springy steps and smilingfaces. They had laid aside their winter and donned their summerclothing, and summer was in their hearts as well.
But the _Snowbird_, the once beautiful _Snowbird_, now all scraped withice and bare, should she have holiday attire likewise? She was notforgotten, I do assure you. For days and days men were slung in ropesoverboard, on all sides of her, scraping, and painting, and polishing;men were hung like herrings aloft, scraping and varnishing there; andsoon the decks were scrubbed to a snowy whiteness, and every bit ofbrass about her shone like burnished gold. She seemed a spick-and-spannew _Snowbird_, and, what is more, she seemed to feel it too, and giveherself all the additional airs and graces she could think of.
At long last the seagulls came sailing to meet her, and a day or twothereafter,--
"Land, ho!" was the glad cry from the outlook aloft. Only a long bluemist on the distant horizon, developing itself soon however, into ablack line capped with green. Presently the dark line grew bigger,
andthen it became fringed beneath with a line of snowy white.
Shetland once again; and when it opened out more, and began to fall offto the bow, the primitive cottages could be descried, and the diminutivecattle and the sheep that browsed on its braes.
Even great Oscar, the Saint Bernard, must needs put his paws on thebulwarks, and gaze with a longing sniff towards the land, then jumpingon deck go bounding along, barking for very joy; and as the little Skyelooked so miserable because