elf, I threw
away my knife and flint, and caught up the spark. The Dean drew
instantly from his pocket the bit of cotton cloth which we had tried to
light with the lens the day before, and thrust it in my hand. I put the
spark upon it, and then blew.

"The first breath drove all the Dean's light cotton stuff away, and the
spark was gone.

"But we were now no longer where we were before. The Spark had been made
once, and it could be made again; and our hearts were bounding with
delight. 'Hurrah! hurrah!' shouted the Dean, 'we're all right now!'

"But our troubles about the fire were very far from ended. We had no
difficulty in getting another spark to catch in another piece of this
strange sort of tinder, of which we found great plenty near at hand. But
it would not blaze. With the slightest breath it vanished almost as a
flash of powder; and it was long before we hit upon anything that would
do us any further good. We tried all the pieces of cotton cloth that we
had about our clothes, picking it into shreds, and, putting the lighted
tinder among these shreds, tried to make them blaze. But no blaze could
we get. Once only did we raise a little flash, but it was gone in a
single instant. We tried the dry leaves of the fire-plant (Andromeda),
the dry grass,--everything, indeed, we could think of that was within
our reach,--but still no blaze, no blaze.

"With sore fingers and wearied patience, and with wits as well as bodies
quite exhausted, we fell once more asleep, with mingling thoughts of
triumph and disappointment, and with prayerful hopes for what the morrow
might bring forth running through our minds.

"When the morrow came, a chance seemed to open for us; and we resolved
to go about our work with caution, determined, since we had gone thus
far, that we would in the end succeed. I don't know whether it was the
Dean or I that first suggested it, but we made up our minds that the
moss which we had turned up with the narwhal horn, when we were
building at the hut, some of which had dried, would burn. We picked to
pieces some of the long fibres of this moss, and laid upon them,
loosely, some fragments of the tinder. A spark was struck as before, and
upon blowing this a bright blaze flashed up, and then died out again as
quickly as it had come.

"'I have it now!' shouted the Dean, 'we're sure of it next time!' and
without saying another word he darted off towards the beach. When he
came back again, he held in one