Page:Morley roberts--Blue Peter--sea yarns.djvu/128

112 "Now then, you stokehold scum, less jaw there, you won't get drowned this trip."

They were exceedingly glad to hear it, for a lot of them were of a different opinion and said so. There was no time to waste, and indeed none was lost. The real trouble began when it was found that one boat wouldn't swim, after the manner and custom of boats in the Mercantile Marine, and when another was staved in by a swinging lump of ice the moment it took the water. This lump was a small 'calf' of the larger berg which they had struck on, and the next moment the original obstacle swung alongside and ground heavily against the steamer.

"There ain't enough boats," said the skipper. "Mr. Ward, d'ye think you could hook on to that berg? We'll have to board it and make out as best we can." As the Swan was a vessel of close on fourteen hundred tons, her kedge anchor ought to have weighed something like four and a half hundred-weight. As a matter of fact it had once belonged to something in the shape of a tug, and it weighed barely two. Ward picked it up as if it was a toy and hove it on the berg, and followed it with a warp.