Canada, Eastern -- Description and travel -- Fiction; Outdoor life -- Canada, Eastern -- Fiction
The sun went down that night in a blaze of wondrous glory. No human
artist would dare be so prodigal with his colors or resort to such
marvelous blendings of shades as the Almighty Artist paints into His
sunsets upon the sky of the Arctic and sub-Arctic regions. The sunset
on this occasion was unusually gorgeous. Brilliant reds shaded up into
opalescent purples, deep orange into lighter yellow, reaching to the
very dome of heaven. The water reflected the red, and the _North Star_
seemed steaming through a mighty heaving, throbbing sea of blood. It
was as though the earth’s very heart had been laid bare.
For a long time it lasted. Paul and his friends stood enthralled. It
made them breathe deeply. They felt that they were in the presence of
some mighty power, that very near them was the Master Himself, He who
guides the world in its eternal journey, and holds in their places the
innumerable millions of stars and untold other worlds that reach out
into infinite space.
“Isn’t this wonderful--wonderful!” exclaimed Paul, at the end of a
period of breathless awe.
“I never saw anything to compare with it!” declared Ainsworth. “It’s
beyond the dreams of my wildest imagination!”
“It’s nowhere but in the North that such sunsets are ever seen,” said
Remington.
“Fine sunset, sir. Fine sunset,” remarked Captain Bluntt, as he passed
them on his way to the chart house.
“It promises a good day tomorrow, doesn’t it?” asked Remington
“Not so sure of that, sir. Not so sure of that.”
Captain Bluntt’s pessimistic prophecy of the morrow’s weather was well
founded. When day broke the sea was enveloped in a blanket of
fog--thick, stifling, impenetrable. The rigging dripped moisture, the
decks were wet and slippery, the atmosphere was heavy, clammy,
difficult to breathe.
For two days the fog lay over the sea like a pall. The _North Star_,
her engines working at slow speed, felt her way cautiously, for she
was in uncharted waters. The tremendous tides of Ungava Bay render
navigation here dangerous, even under the most favorable conditions,
and Captain Bluntt was not the man to take undue risks, though he was
a fearless seaman, and in his time had done many dashing and daring
deeds, when circumstances had demanded.
Following the fog came several hours of cold dismal rain, accompanied
by sleet. Then the clouds broke, and as though some fairy hand had
brushed them away, the sky cleared and the sun shone warm and
beautiful to cheer the depressed world.
“And there lies Cape Wolstenholm, sir,” said Captain Bluntt, pointing
toward a low-lying coast off their port bow. “We’ll soon be in Hudson
Bay now, sir, and what’s your pleasure?”
“While the fine weather holds I think we’d better do some fishing,”
answered Remington. “Besides, I think we all want to get ashore to
stretch our legs.”
“As you say--as you say, sir! But we’ll have to locate some huskies,
sir, and get a native pilot.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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