The sudden change in the weather had, of course, played the deuce with my plans. It would have been madness to attempt to break through the Shetland blockade in weather so clear as this. I therefore decided to keep at a safe distance from the patrol line, and wait for a change of weather. I laid a course for the point--several hundred miles north-east of the Faroes--at which the Polar Circle intersects the meridian of Greenwich. CHAPTER XI ON THE EDGE OF THE ARCTIC SEA Towards four o'clock of the following day we had reached the point aforesaid. And now it was hard to know what to do, for the air was still clear, the sea glassy-calm, with no indications of an early change. So far, we had seen no ice, though we were now on the edge of the Arctic Ocean. From that we might conclude that the route north-about round Iceland was not yet practicable, for the ice had not yet broken up. To run the blockade was, in existing circumstances, hopeless; especially as it was nearing full-moon, and in these high latitudes there was, properly speaking, no night at all. I decided simply to stop the engines, and lie to all the next day. This kind of weather could not last for ever, and the date of my rendezvous gave me a couple of days to play with. For the moment there was not much danger, for no enemy craft was likely to penetrate so far north. If the English were to have to look out for German ships up here, they might as well extend their outpost-line to the North Pole. In fact, if there was any risk at all, it came from our own submarines, not all of which could have received a warning about our voyage. The stopping of the engines enabled some necessary repairs to be carried out, and all the machinery was carefully overhauled, for there was no knowing to what severe tests it might be put before all was done. The deck-hands occupied themselves in repainting the flags and lettering upon our sides, which, owing to the unfavourable conditions in which these works of art had had their birth, had been reduced by weather and water to a confusion of dots and splashes, which might well account for some of the suspicious looks we had encountered. The day ended with a concert, which my second-officer opened, only too appropriately, with a song beginning, 'Calm lies the sea.' So pressing was the problem, what we were to do during the next twenty-four hours, that before turning in that night I held a council with my officers in our little mess-room.