opening I’ll sail, if I coast along it till th’ day o’ judgment.”  But, for all our sailing, we never seemed to come nearer to th’ opening.  The waters were rocking beneath us, and the sky were steady above us; and th’ ice rose out o’ the waters, and seemed to reach up into the sky.  We sailed on, and we sailed on, for more days nor I could count.  Our captain were a strange, wild man, but once he looked a little pale when he came upo’ deck after his turn-in, and saw the green-gray ice going straight up on our beam.  Many on us thought as the ship were bewitched for th’ captain’s words; and we got to speak low, and to say our prayers o’ nights, and a kind o’ dull silence came into th’ very air; our voices did na’ rightly seem our own.  And we sailed on, and we sailed on.  All at once, th’ man as were on watch gave a cry:  he saw a break in the ice, as we’d begun to think were everlasting; and we all gathered towards the bows, and the captain called to th’ man at the helm to keep her course, and cocked his head, and began to walk the quarter-deck jaunty again.  And we came to a great cleft in th’ long weary rock of ice; and the sides o’ th’ cleft were not jagged, but went straight sharp down into th’ foaming waters.  But we took but one look at what lay inside, for our captain, with a loud cry to God, bade the helmsman steer nor’ards away fra’ th’ mouth o’ Hell.  We all saw wi’ our own eyes, inside that fearsome wall o’ ice—­seventy miles long, as we could swear to—­inside that gray, cold ice, came leaping flames, all red and yellow wi’ heat o’ some unearthly kind out o’ th’ very waters o’ the sea; making our eyes dazzle wi’ their scarlet blaze, that shot up as high, nay, higher than th’ ice around, yet never so much as a shred on ’t was melted.  They did say that some beside our captain saw the black devils dart hither and thither, quicker than the very flames themselves; anyhow, he saw them.  And as he knew it were his own daring as had led him to have that peep at terrors forbidden to any on us afore our time, he just dwined away, and we hadn’t taken but one whale afore our captain died, and first mate took th’ command.  It were a prosperous voyage; but, for all that, I’ll never sail those seas again, nor ever take wage aboard an American again.’

‘Eh, dear! but it’s awful t’ think o’ sitting wi’ a man that has seen th’ doorway into hell,’ said Bell, aghast.

Sylvia had dropped her work, and sat gazing at Kinraid with fascinated wonder.

Daniel was just a little annoyed at the admiration which his own wife and daughter were bestowing on the specksioneer’s wonderful stories, and he said—­

‘Ay, ay.  If a’d been a talker, ye’d ha’ thought a deal more on me nor ye’ve iver done yet.  A’ve seen such things, and done such things.’

‘Tell us, father!’ said Sylvia, greedy and breathless.