rolling sea, its
high-uplifted weather-vane glittering in the sun, with each of its ends
always pointing bravely to the south.

CHAPTER XIV. A REGION OF NOTHINGNESS

In the office of the Works at Sardis, side by side at the table on
which stood the telegraph instrument, Margaret Raleigh and Roland Clewe,
receiving the daily reports from the Dipsey, had found themselves in
such sympathy and harmony with the party they had sent out on this
expedition that they too, in fancy, had slowly groped their way under
the grim overhanging ice out into the open polar sea. They too had stood
on the deck of the vessel which had risen like a spectre out of the
waters, and in the cold, clear atmosphere had gazed about them at this
hitherto unknown part of the world. They had thrilled with enthusiastic
excitement when the ring on the deck of the Dipsey was placed over the
actual location of the pole; they had been filled with anger when they
heard of the conduct of Rovinski; and their souls had swelled with a
noble love of country and pride in their own achievements when they
heard that they, by their representative, had made the north pole a
part of their native land. They had listened, scarcely breathing, to the
stirring account of the anchoring of the great buoy to one end of the
earth's axis, and they had exclaimed in amazement at the announcement
that in the lonely waters of the pole whales were still to be found,
when they were totally unknown in every other portion of the earth.

But now the stirring events in the arctic regions which had so held
and enthralled them day by day had, after a time, ceased. Mr. Gibbs
was engaged in making experiments, observations, and explorations,
the result of which he would embody in carefully prepared reports, and
Sammy's daily message promised to be rather monotonous. Roland Clewe
felt the great importance of a thorough exploration and examination
of the polar sea. The vessel he had sent out had reached this hitherto
inaccessible region, but it was not at all certain that another voyage,
even of the same kind, would be successful. Consequently he advised
those in charge of the expedition not to attempt to return until the
results of their work were as complete as possible. Should the arctic
night overtake them before they left the polar sea, this would not
interfere with their return in the same manner in which they had gone
north, for in a submarine voyage artificial light would be n