Page:Works of Jules Verne - Parke - Vol 2.djvu/380

 teras calculated that they had made a hundred miles. He devoted the morning to repairing sundry articles and to religious worship, and started again about noon. The temperature was cold, only 32° above zero, and the air very clear.

Suddenly, without any warning and without any apparent reason, a sort of vapor began to rise from the ground, and condensed into minute frozen particles, instantly filling the atmosphere like dense fog, and rising to the height of about ninety feet, where it remained stationary. It was impossible to see a foot before one, and long prismatic crystals hung from everybody's clothes.

This was the frost rime that had surprised the travelers, and its first effect was to make them wish to keep close together. Each began feeling and fumbling for the other, and calling out his name. But in this dense fog there was not only no seeing, but no hearing, for sounds cannot pass through it.

The same thought apparently struck each to fire a gun as a signal. But the confusion that followed was indescribable, for the noise was echoed far and wide, in one continuous roll.

Each man was left to his own instinct, and each acted in a characteristic manner. Hatteras stopped short, and stood with his arms folded to wait patiently. Simpson managed to keep fast by the sledge. Bell felt for foot-marks on the ground, and the Doctor went tumbling about among the great blocks of ice, now going to the left and then to the right, and the losing himself completely.

After stumbling along in this fashion for five minutes or so, he said to himself:

"This can't last! Strange climate; rather too freaky for my taste. There is no reckoning on it. Hallo, captain, where are you?" he shouted again.

But there was no response, and he resolved to reload his gun and fire a second time.

While doing this, he fancied he could discern the outlines of some dark object close by, and he called out:

"At last! Hatteras, Bell, Simpson, who is it? Speak!"

A low growl was the only reply.

"Ha! what can this be?" thought the good little man.

The moving mass came nearer, its proportions being in-