rapid that it was necessary to wet the rope to prevent its taking fire from the excessive friction. When the whale at last slackened speed, the line was carefully drawn up by degrees, and coiled up again. Presently the animal rose to the surface once more, lashing the sea with her ponderous tail, and making a perfect waterspout, which fell on the boat like a violent shower of rain.
The men began to row vigorously forward, and Simpson seized a lance, and stood ready for combat. But, next moment, their coveted prey darted in between two gigantic ice-mountains, where it would have been dangerous to follow.
"Confound it!" exclaimed Johnson.
"Go on! Go on!" shouted Simpson, wild with excitement. "We are sure of her now."
"But we cannot go after her between those icebergs!" said Johnson.
"Yes, yes, we can," cried Simpson.
While they were still discussing whether to venture or not, the question was settled for them, for the passage began rapidly to close; and Johnson had only barely time to cut the rope with a hatchet when the rocky walls met, crushing the unfortunate animal between them with irresistible force.
"Lost!" exclaimed Simpson.
"Saved!" was Johnson's reply; while the Doctor, who had never shown the white feather throughout, coolly said, "My word! but that was a sight worth seeing."
The crushing power of these mountains is prodigious. The whale had met with no unusual death; for Scoresby mentions the fact that, in one summer, thirty whales perished in Baffin's Bay in a similar manner. He also saw a ship with three masts smashed flat, and two other ships were pierced through, as if by a lance, by fallen icebergs more than a hundred feet long, with sharp spiked ends, which met together across the decks.
A few minutes later, the boat regained the brig, and was drawn up to its accustomed place on deck.
"It is a lesson," said Shandon, aloud, "for rash people who will venture into narrow channels."
