"Never mind, captain, cheer up; all may yet be well," exclaimed the baronet. "We can't drag your ship _over_ the ice, but if there is only a passage for her we can drag her _through_ it, and for little Florrie's sake we will. If it is in our power to get you to the spot you wish to reach, you shall go there. Now, as the present open water affords an opportunity too good to be lost, return to your ship, secure our hawser in such a way that we may put a big strain upon it without damaging the vessel, and send a trustworthy hand aloft into the crow's-nest to look out for the best channels. We will tow you to the northward as long as a channel can be found through the ice, and at seven o'clock I hope you will give us the pleasure of your company on board here to dinner, when we will drink `many happy returns of the day' to Florrie in the best champagne the _Flying Fish's_ cellar affords." The captain of the whaler returned to his own ship in a state of such mingled astonishment and elation that his people were at first inclined to think he had suddenly gone demented. However, the order which he gave them to secure the towing hawser in such a manner as would enable the ship to withstand a heavy strain was intelligible enough; it told them that, with the assistance of their strange rescuers, a supreme effort was now to be made to reach those prolific fishing-grounds which had from the first been the goal of their voyage; and that, best of all, that effort was to be unaccompanied by any of the usual harassing labour of working the ship to windward through the ice, and they set to with a will. A sufficient length of the hawser was hauled on board to enable them to take a couple of turns round the barrel of the windlass and two more round the heel of the foremast, the eye of the hawser being further secured by tackles to every ring-bolt in the ship capable of bearing a good substantial strain; and then, the skipper himself going aloft to the crow's-nest, the signal was given for the _Flying Fish_ to go ahead. CHAPTER TEN. THE "HUMBOLDT" GLACIER.