Page:An Antarctic Mystery.pdf/293

Rh rate of progress of our iceberg since it had passed the pole. Captain Len Guy, however, and West, considered themselves safe in reckoning it at two hundred and fifty miles.

The current did not seem to have diminished in speed or changed its course. It was now beyond a doubt that we were moving between the two halves of a continent, one on the east, the other on the west, which formed the vast antarctic region. And I thought it was matter of great regret that we could not get aground on one or the other side of this vast strait, whose surface would presently be solidified by the coming of winter.

When I expressed this sentiment to Captain Len Guy, he made me the only logical answer:

"What would you have, Mr. Jeorling? We are powerless. There is nothing to be done, and the persistent fog is the worst part of our ill luck. I no longer know where we are. It is impossible to take an observation, and this befalls us just as the sun is about to disappear for long months."

"Let me come back to the question of the boat," said I, "for the last time. Could we not, with the boat—"

"Go on a discovery cruise? Can you think of such a thing? That would be an imprudence I would not commit, even though the crew would allow me."

I was on the point of exclaiming: "And what if your brother and your countrymen have found refuge on some spot of the land that undoubtedly lies about us?"

But I restrained myself. Of what avail was it to reawaken our captain's grief? He, too, must have contemplated this eventuality, and he had not renounced