ach, he examined its under side. As he did so, I
saw him give a little start, as though there were something about it to
cause him surprise, but just as I reached out my hand to ask him to let
me see it, he threw it back into the water out of reach--an action which
struck me as being hardly polite.

"I must be off," said he, in apparent haste, "so, good-bye. Hope you
will get your crop in before it snows. Looks threatening to me; you'll
have to hurry, I think."

This prediction seemed to me rather absurd, with the thermometer at zero
and the sky as clear as crystal; but Yetmore was an indoor man and could
not be expected to judge as can one whose daily work depends so much
upon what the weather is doing or is going to do. It did not occur to me
then--though it did later--that he only wanted us to get to work again
at once, and so divert our minds from the subject of the ground ice.

As I made no comment on his remark, Yetmore walked away, remounted his
horse and rode off; while Joe and I went briskly to work again.

We had been at it some time, when Joe stopped sawing, and straightening
up, said:

"It's queer about those bits of ground ice, Phil. Do you notice how they
all float clean side up? Wait a bit and I'll show you."

Taking the ice-hook, he turned over one of the bits with its point,
showing its soiled side, but the moment he released it, the bit of ice
"turned turtle" again.

"Do you see?" said he. "The sand acts like ballast. It must be heavy
stuff."

"Yes," said I. "Hook a bit of it out and let's look at it."

This was soon done, when, on examining it, we found the under side to be
crusted with very black sand, which, whatever might be its nature, was
evidently heavy enough to upset the balance of a small fragment of ice.

"What is it made of, I wonder?" said Joe.

"I don't know," I replied, "but perhaps it is that black sand which the
prospectors are always complaining of as getting in their way when they
are panning for gold."

"That's what it is, Phil, I expect," cried Joe. "And what's more, that's
what Yetmore thought, too, or else why should he throw that bit of ice
back into the water so quickly when you held out your hand for it? He
didn't want you to see it."

"It does look like it," I assented. "Poke up a few more, Joe, and we
will take them home and show them to my father: perhaps he'll know what
the stuff is."

Joe took the ice-hook and prodded about on the bottom, every prod
brin