They were safe; but the ship and its contents, their furs, their whalebone, and all their dear and valuable possessions, were being rolled and hammered in the mass of broken ice that the great Arctic pack was still crushing and piling shoreward. Yet they did not give way to grief or repining. Nothing could show the manly spirit and self-reliance which their lonely life had bred in them more than this. They were calm, even serene, thankful for their lives, and confident that, having been spared those, they would yet be able to win their way back to civilization with honor, if not with fortune. It cured their homesickness, too. Nothing is so good for this as a batch of real and present trouble and physical discomfort. Physical weariness, a moderate amount of hunger, and something with which to battle, along with a feeling that you can overcome it, will make any real man satisfied with his lot. I know this sounds like a paradox; but just try it, as Harry and Joe did. CHAPTER IX IN THE ENEMY’S POWER There are no tides on the Arctic coast as we of the temperate zones know tides. In calm weather the rise and fall of the sea is scarcely noticeable. In time of southerly storm, however, the wind and ice carry the water out across the shallow sea, and when the winds rage from the north they crowd it back again upon the land. Hence, with the rush of the ice pack to the shore there came a small tidal wave, with the result that the pack and the shore ice, crowded and crumpled together, were carried far up on the land. With the subsiding of the gale two days later, the receding waters left this great ridge piled there thirty to fifty feet high, a monument to the brave ship that it had wrecked, and to the power of the primeval Arctic forces. Scattered through this rough ridge were the remnants of the wreck. Here a mast protruded, there a shattered plank of the hull, but to find anything of use to the wrecked Crusoes was difficult. When the ice melted, as it would in part during the brief summer, more might be revealed, but for now they were dependent on the hospitality of their Eskimo friends.