But Yankee energy was indomitable.  C. quietly arranged his painting—­apparatus, and I, wrapped in my cloak more snugly, crept out forward on the little deck, a sort of look-out.  To be honest, I began to wish ourselves on our way back, as the black, angry-looking swells chased us up, and flung the foam upon the bow and stern.  All at once, whole squadrons of fog swept up, and swamped the whole of us, boat and berg, in their thin, white obscurity.  For a moment we thought ourselves foiled again.  But still the word was, “On!” And on they pulled, the hard-handed fishermen, now flushed and moist with rowing.  Again the ice was visible, but dimly, in his misty drapery.  There was no time to be lost.  Now, or not at all.  And so C. began.  For half an hour, pausing occasionally for passing flocks of fog, he plied the brush with a rapidity not usual, and under disadvantages that would have mastered a less experienced hand.  We were getting close down upon the berg, and in fearfully rough water.  In their curiosity to catch glimpses of the advancing sketch, the men pulled with little regularity, and trimmed the boat very badly.  We were rolling frightfully to a landsman.  C. begged of them to keep their seats, and hold the barge just there as near as possible.  To amuse them, I passed an opera-glass around among them, with which they examined the iceberg and the coast.  They turned out to be excellent good fellows, and entered into the spirit of the thing in a way that pleased us.  I am sure they would have held on willingly till dark, if C. had only said the word, so much interest did they feel in the attempt to paint the “island-of-ice.”  The hope was to linger about it until sunset, for its colors, lights, and shadows.  That, however, was suddenly extinguished.  Heavy fog came on, and we retreated, not with the satisfaction of a conquest, nor with the disappointment of a defeat, but cheered with the hope of complete success, perhaps the next day, when C. thought that we could return upon our game in a little steamer, and so secure it beyond the possibility of escape.  The seine was hauled from the stern to the centre of the barge, and the men pulled away for Torbay, a long six miles, rough and chilly.  For my part, I was trembling with cold, and found it necessary to lend a hand at the oars, an exercise which soon made the weather feel several degrees warmer, and rendered me quite comfortable.  After a little the wind lulled, the fog dispersed again, and the iceberg seemed to contemplate our slow departure with complacent serenity.  We regretted that the hour forbade a return.  It would have been pleasant to play around that Parthenon of the sea in the twilight.  The best that was left us was to look back and watch the effects of light, which were wonderfully fine, and had the charm of entire novelty.  The last view was the very finest.  All the east front was a most tender blue; the fissures on the southern face, from which we were rowing directly away, were glittering green; the western front glowed in the yellow sunlight; around were the dark waters, and above one of the most beautiful of skies.