As there was enough open water to row in for a while Wolfe took the oars, and Breeze busied himself with the rescued man. He rolled him in the blankets they had brought, rubbed his hands and limbs briskly, and offered him food. Hank declined this, but asked for water, saying that he was dying of thirst. “Why didn’t you get a drink on the iceberg?” asked Breeze, in surprise. “I’m sure there was plenty of water there; or you might have eaten a bit of ice.” At the same time he got out their little keg of water and handed it to the sufferer. “I didn’t suppose an iceberg was made of fresh ice,” replied Hank, eagerly seizing the keg and applying his lips to the bung-hole for a long drink. The next instant he dropped it, spat out the mouthful of water he had taken, and sank down in the bottom of the boat with a groan. “What is the matter?” cried Breeze, picking up the keg. As Hank made no answer, he lifted it to his own lips and tasted of its contents. It was full of salt water. [Illustration: AND THE TWO ATHLETIC YOUNG FELLOWS DREW THE ALMOST HELPLESS FORM OF THEIR SHIPMATE SLOWLY BUT STEADILY TO WHERE THEY STOOD.] There was no time then for questions or explanations, as the floes on either side of them began closing together so rapidly that the dory was in danger of being crushed between them. The boys sprang from the boat, and managed to drag it out on the ice, just as the drifting masses met with a shock that ground their edges to powder and nearly threw Breeze and Wolfe from their feet. Then began a struggle similar to that which they had gone through in the morning, only with the danger increased a hundred-fold by the darkness. Now they dragged the dory by main strength over some great cake that lay squarely in their way, then, both in the boat, they used the oars as poles and pushed it along from piece to piece. Occasionally a submerged mass would rise beneath the boat, and it was only by the greatest activity that they prevented it from capsizing. Several times one or the other of them slipped into the icy water; but they always clung to the dory, and managed to pull themselves out. But for the flare, that continued to blaze brightly from the schooner’s deck, they would have given over the struggle a dozen times. Hank could lend them no assistance, but lay, numbed and stupid, in the bottom of the boat, a dead-weight. At last, when after a harder struggle than usual, on account of their exhaustion, they had again dragged the dory out on the ice, Breeze threw himself down in it exclaiming, “I’m about done for, Wolfe; and I’m afraid we’ve got to give it up.” “I feel the same way myself,” said Wolfe, “I can’t pull another pound.”