le state-
rooms that night, and were lulled to sweet dreamless slumber by the
howling of the gale outside.

The four following days were spent in the same manner--the gale lasting
all that time with unabated fury, accompanied by an almost ceaseless
fall of snow. But on the fifth day the weather moderated; the snow
ceased, or at all events fell only intermittently; the wind backed round
and blew from the south-west; and the exterior temperature, which during
the gale had fallen to thirty-three degrees below zero, rose twenty
degrees. The sky was still overcast and lowering, it is true, and the
cold was still intense. But notwithstanding this the weather, compared
with that of the preceding five days, seemed positively fine; and,
wrapping themselves up in their warmest clothing, and arming themselves
with pick and shovel, they set out to discover if possible what lay
concealed beneath the two queer-looking poles.

CHAPTER ELEVEN.

AN INTERESTING RELIC.

They issued from the ship through the trap-door in her bottom; and no
sooner did they find themselves in the open air than an almost
uncontrollable impulse seized them to go back again. The contrast
between the warm comfortable temperature of the ship's interior and the
bitter piercing cold without was so great that at first the latter felt
quite unendurable. They, however, persevered; and, after perhaps ten
minutes of intense suffering, the severe exercise of scrambling over the
rotten slippery hummocks somewhat restored their impeded circulation,
and they began to feel that, perhaps, after all, they might be able to
do something toward the execution of their self-imposed task. The mere
act of breathing, however, continued to be exceedingly painful; and when
they at length reached the spot of which they were in search, they were
able to fully realise, for the first time in their lives, the incredible
difficulties attendant upon the exploration of the regions within the
polar circles.

On a nearer inspection of the two poles they proved to be stout spars
about the thickness of a man's leg; and, from the appearance in each of
a sort of sheave-hole, Lieutenant Mildmay declared his conviction that
they were the masts of a small ship. They were very rotten, however,
and, if Mildmay's surmise was indeed correct, the craft must have been
under the ice for a very long time. The mere suggestion was enough to
fully arouse their curiosity; and, forgetful for the mo