“For both the steamer and the whale,” replied Lucille.

On the way to breakfast, Lucille asked an officer if similar instances frequently happened.

“Rarely,” he replied, but added, “very likely we may see other whales in this vicinity.”  Sure enough, after breakfast, children ran up and down the deck shouting, “Whales!  Whales!” and several were seen a mile or two north of the ship’s course, where they sported and spouted water.

About four o’clock, the temperature having fallen several degrees, the passengers sighted to the northeast a huge iceberg in the shape of an arch, bearing down on the steamer’s course, and had it been night, possibly freighted with all the horrors of a ship-wreck.  As it was, Captain Morgan deemed it wise to lessen the speed as the ship approached the iceberg.

“This is wonderful, Leo,” said Mrs. Harris; “can you tell us where and when icebergs are formed?”

“Oh yes, Mrs. Harris, icebergs that float down the Atlantic are born on the west coast of Greenland.  Up there great valleys are filled with snow and ice from hill-top to hill-top, reaching back up the valleys, in some instances from thirty to forty miles.  This valley-ice is called a ’Mer de Glace,’ and has a motion down the valley, like any river, but of three feet more or less only per day.  If time enough is allowed, vast quantities of this valley-ice move into the gulf or sea.  When the sea is disturbed by a storm the ice wall or precipice is broken off, and enormous masses, often a hundred times larger than a big building, fall and float away with the report of the firing of a park of artillery, and these floating mountains of ice are lighted in their lonely pathways by the midnight sun.”

Before dinner, came the regular promenade which presented many contrasts.  A pretty bride from the Blue Grass Region of Kentucky walked with her young husband whom she had first met at a New England seaside.  She was glad to aid in bridging the chasm between north and south.  Her traveling dress of blue was appropriately trimmed with gray.

The gorgeously dressed gambler walked on the deck alone.  Then came two modest nuns dressed in gray and white.  Alfonso and his mother, the judge and Lucille, and a group of little children followed.  Dr. Argyle and a Philadelphia heiress kept step.  Everybody walked, talked, and laughed, and the passengers had little need of the ship’s doctor now.  If the weather is fair the decks are always enlivened as a steamer approaches land.  The next day, by noon at latest, Ireland and Fastnet Rock would be sighted, if the ship’s reckoning had been correct.

After dinner, Dr. Argyle was walking the deck with Lucille in the star-light.  He had told her much of his family, of his talented brother in the Church, and of another in the army; he had even ventured to speak of Lucille’s grace of manner, and she feared what might follow.  The call of Mrs. Harris relieved Lucille of an unpleasant situation.