a gigantic town with its beaten-down obelisks,
its overthrown steeples and palaces turned upside down all in a
lump--in fact, a genuine chaos. The sun threw long oblique rays of
a light without warmth, as if heat-absorbing substances were placed
between it and that gloomy country. The sea seemed to be frozen to
the remotest limits of view.

"How shall we get through?" exclaimed the doctor.

"I have not the least idea," replied Shandon; "but we will get through,
even if we are obliged to employ powder to blow up those mountains,
for I certainly won't let that ice shut me up till next spring."

"Nevertheless, such was the fate of the _Fox_, almost in these same
quarters. Never mind," continued the doctor, "we shall get through
with a little philosophy. Believe me, that is worth all the engines
in the world."

"You must acknowledge," replied Shandon, "that the year doesn't begin
under very favourable auspices."

"That is incontestable, and I notice that Baffin's Sea has a tendency
to return to the same state in which it was before 1817."

"Then you think, doctor, that the present state of things has not
always existed?"

"Yes; from time to time there are vast breakings up which scientific
men can scarcely explain; thus, up to 1817 this sea was constantly
obstructed, when suddenly an immense cataclysm took place which drove
back these icebergs into the ocean, the great part of which were
stranded on Newfoundland Bank. From that time Baffin's Bay has been
almost free, and has become the haunt of numerous whalers."

"Then, since that epoch, voyages to the north have been easier?"

"Incomparably so; but for the last few years it has been observed
that the bay has a tendency to be closed up again, and according to
investigations made by navigators, it may probably be so for a long
time--a still greater reason for us to go on as far as possible. Just
now we look like people who get into unknown galleries, the doors
of which are always shut behind them."

"Do you advise me to back out?" asked Shandon, endeavouring to read
the answer in the doctor's eyes.

"I! I have never known how to take a step backward, and should we
never return, I say 'Go ahead.' However, I should like to make known
to you that if we do anything imprudent, we know very well what we
are exposed to."

"Well, Garry, what do you think about it?" asked Shandon of the sailor.

"I? Commander, I should go on; I'm of the same opinion as Mr.
Clawbonny