Another cry of alarm mingled with his as he uttered it.

"The iceberg!" cried Ben.

The old sailor pointed ahead and there, like a huge ghost drifting toward them, was a mighty structure of ice--the first berg the boys had ever seen. With its slow advance came another peril. The air grew deathly cold and a mist began to rise from the chilled sea.

"Signal the Brutus!" shouted Captain Barrington, but the fires had been extinguished on the Southern Cross when she was taken in tow, and she had nothing to signal with but her rapid firing gun. This was fired again and again and soon through the mist there came back the low moan of the siren of the Brutus.

"They won't dare to put back after us in this," exclaimed Captain Barrington, as he stood on the bridge with the boys beside him, "we shall have to drift helplessly here till the iceberg pa.s.ses or--"

"Until we are crushed," put in Captain Hazzard quietly, "wouldn't it be as well to have the boats made ready for lowering," he went on.

"A good idea," agreed Captain Barrington. Ben Stubbs was summoned aft and told to give the necessary orders, and soon the men were at work clearing the life-boats in case things should come to the worst.

The mist grew momentarily denser and the cold more intense, yet so critical was the situation that n.o.body thought of leaving the decks to don warmer clothing. The fog, caused by the immense berg chilling the warmer ocean currents, was now so thick that of the mighty berg itself they could perceive nothing. The knowledge that the peril was invisible did not make the minds of those on board the drifting vessel any the easier.

"If only we had steam we could get out of the berg's path," said Captain Barrington, stamping his foot.

"Couldn't we hoist sail," suggested Frank.

"There is no wind. I wish there were," replied the captain, "then it would blow this mist away and we could at least see where we are driving to."

In breathless silence and surrounded by the dense curtain of freezing mist the polar ship drifted helplessly on, those on board realizing that at any moment there might come the crash and disaster that would follow a collision with the monster berg.

Suddenly there came a shock that almost threw those on the bridge off their feet.

Hoa.r.s.e cries and shouts sounded through the mist from the bow of the ship, which was no longer visible in the dense smother.

Above all the confused noises one rang out clear and terrible.

"The berg has struck us. We are sinking!" was the terrible cry.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE SHIP OF OLAF THE VIKING.

"Stop all that confusion," roared Captain Barrington through his megaphone, which he had s.n.a.t.c.hed from its place on the bridge.

Silence instantly followed, only to be succeeded by a tearing and rending sound.

The rigging of the foremast had caught in a projecting ridge of the berg and was being torn out. The ship trembled and shook as if a giant hand was crushing her, but so far her heavy timbers seemed to have stood the shock. Presently the noises ceased and the air began to grow less chilly.

"I believe we are free of the berg!" shouted Captain Hazzard.

The rapid clearing away of the dense fog that had hung like a pall about the seemingly doomed ship confirmed this belief. By great good fortune the Southern Cross had been spared the fate of many ships that venture into the polar seas, and the boys gazing backward from the bridge could see the mighty berg, looking as huge as a cathedral, slowly increasing its distance from them, as it was borne along on the current.

"Hurrah, we are safe!" cried Harry.

"Don't be too sure," warned Captain Barrington. "I hope we are, but the vessel will have to be examined before we can be certain. In any event our foremast and bowsprit are sad wrecks."

The portions of the ship he referred to were, indeed, badly damaged.

The shrouds supporting the foremast had been ripped out by the berg on the port or left hand side of the vessel, and her jibboom had been snapped off short where the berg struck her. Two boats had, besides, been broken and the paint sc.r.a.ped off the polar ship's sides.

"We look like a wreck," exclaimed Billy.

"We may think ourselves lucky we got off so easily," said Captain Barrington, "we have just gone through the deadliest peril an antarctic ship can undergo."

The Brutus now came gliding up, and after congratulations had been exchanged between the two ships, a new hawser was rigged and the Southern Cross was once more taken in tow.

"I don't want any more encounters with icebergs," said Billy, as the ship proceeded toward her goal once more.

"Nor I," spoke the others.

"It's a pity this isn't at the north pole," said the professor, who was varnishing dried fish in the cabin, where this conversation took place.

"Why?" asked Frank.

"Because, if it had been, there might have been a polar bear on that iceberg. I have read that sometimes they drift away on bergs that become detached and are sighted by steamers quite far south."

"Why,--do you want a polar bear skin," asked Billy, "you can buy lots of them in New York."

"Oh, I don't care about the polar bear," said the professor quickly, "but the creatures have a kind of flea on them that is very rare."

At the idea of hunting such great animals as polar bears for such insignificant things as fleas, the boys all had to laugh. The professor, who was very good-natured, was not at all offended.

"Small animals are sometimes quite as interesting as large ones," was all he said.

The next day the rigging and bowsprit were refitted and further and further south steamed the Brutus with the polar ship in tow. The fires of the Southern Cross had now been started and her acetylene gas plant started going as the heat and light were needed. Icebergs were now frequently met with and the boys often remained on deck at night, snugly wrapped in furs, to watch the great ma.s.ses of ice drift by.

Although they were as dangerous as ever, now that the ships were in cooler water the bergs did not create a fog as they did in the warmer region further north. By keeping a sharp lookout during the day and using the searchlights at night, Captain Barrington felt fairly confident of avoiding another encounter with an ice mountain. The damage the ship had sustained in her narrow escape from annihilation had proved quite difficult to repair, though before the vessel reached the sixtieth parallel it had been adjusted.

"Well, boys," announced Captain Hazzard one day at noon, "we are now not more than three hundred miles from the Great Barrier."

"Beyond which lies the polar mystery," exclaimed Frank.

Captain Hazzard glanced at him quickly.

"Yes, the polar mystery," he repeated, "perhaps now is as good a time as any for telling you boys the secret of this voyage. Come to my cabin and I will tell you one of the objects of our expedition, which hitherto has been kept a secret from all but the officers."

The excitement of the boys may be imagined as they followed the captain to his cabin and seated themselves on a seat arranged above the radiator.

"It's the ship of Olaf," whispered Billy to Harry.

"Of course," began Captain Hazzard, "the main object of this expedition is to plant the flag of the United States at 'furthest south,' even if not at the pole itself."

"And to capture a South Polar flea and a fur-bearing pollywog," put in the professor, who had included himself in the invitation to the boys.