ing sun.

But the _Nancy Bell_ was not the only object of attraction and interest.

She was surrounded by icebergs in every direction--to the right, to the
left, right in front, and astern--some little mites not bigger than
cockle-shells in comparison with the larger ones, baby bergs, so to
speak, and others as lofty as mountains, extending as far as the eye
could reach to the horizon; the ship racing by them and threaded her way
in and out between the moving masses with the dexterity of a Highlander
executing the sword-dance. The wind was still blowing more than half a
gale from the northward and westward, and the vessel was running before
it under the fore staysail and mizzentop-sail, which had been dropped
again with the reef points shaken out, making eight knots good, too, at
that.

Where there was no ice, the rolling sea was of an intense ultramarine
blue, reflecting the colour of the distant sky; while, as the sun came
up higher, different tints were displayed by the icebergs, whose shape
was as various as their sizes--bergs that in their gorgeous architecture
and fairy magnificence, with fantastic peaks and airy pinnacles, which
glittered now in the full light of day with all the varied colours of
the rainbow, flashing out scintillations and radiances of violet and
iris, purple and turquoise, and sapphire blue, emerald green and orange,
blush rose and pink and red--all mingled with soft shades of crimson and
carmine, and interspersed with gleams of gold and silver and a frosting
over all of bright white light.

"Ah!" ejaculated Kate, uttering her thoughts aloud, so carried away was
she by the vivid beauty of the scene, "those who haven't seen an iceberg
at sea at sunrise, have no idea of the grand loveliness of God's
handiwork in nature!"

"They look beautiful enough now, missy," said Captain Dinks, who had
come to her side unnoticed, and seemed much jollier than he had done the
night before, when he thought the ship in her last extremity; "but we
didn't think them so a little while ago, when it looked as if the poor
old _Nancy Bell_ would lay her old bones amongst them!"

"Ah! Captain Dinks," replied she, "there was One above looking after us
then, as he is now!"

"You are right," said he earnestly; "or we should never have escaped as
we did; once or twice, when we grazed a berg, I thought it was all up
with us."

"Oh!" exclaimed Kate with a shudder, "it was a terrible night; and you
and the poor fel