the light, and clear clear water overhead; and up he
came a thousand fathoms, among clouds of sea-moths, which fluttered
round his head. There were moths with pink heads and wings and opal
bodies, that flapped about slowly; moths with brown wings that flapped
about quickly; yellow shrimps that hopped and skipped most quickly of
all; and jellies of all the colours in the world, that neither hopped
nor skipped, but only dawdled and yawned, and would not get out of his
way. The dog snapped at them till his jaws were tired; but Tom hardly
minded them at all, he was so eager to get to the top of the water, and
see the pool where the good whales go.

And a very large pool it was, miles and miles across, though the air was
so clear that the ice cliffs on the opposite side looked as if they were
close at hand. All round it the ice cliffs rose, in walls and spires and
battlements, and caves and bridges, and stories and galleries, in which
the ice-fairies live, and drive away the storms and clouds, that Mother
Carey's pool may lie calm from year's end to year's end. And the sun
acted policeman, and walked round outside every day, peeping just over
the top of the ice wall, to see that all went right; and now and then he
played conjuring tricks, or had an exhibition of fireworks, to amuse the
ice-fairies. For he would make himself into four or five suns at once,
or paint the sky with rings and crosses and crescents of white fire, and
stick himself in the middle of them, and wink at the fairies; and I
daresay they were very much amused; for anything's fun in the country.

[Illustration: "That's Mother Carey."--_P. 219._]

And there the good whales lay, the happy sleepy beasts, upon the still
oily sea. They were all right whales, you must know, and finners, and
razor-backs, and bottle-noses, and spotted sea-unicorns with long
ivory horns. But the sperm whales are such raging, ramping, roaring,
rumbustious fellows, that, if Mother Carey let them in, there would be
no more peace in Peacepool. So she packs them away in a great pond by
themselves at the South Pole, two hundred and sixty-three miles
south-south-east of Mount Erebus, the great volcano in the ice; and
there they butt each other with their ugly noses, day and night from
year's end to year's end.

But here there were only good quiet beasts, lying about like the black
hulls of sloops, and blowing every now and then jets of white steam, or
sculling round with their huge mout