explosion; one of the boilers had burst, and the engines were smashed and
useless.

"We were now at the mercy of the sea, the waves, and the icebergs too,
and before another day we were blown far away to sea.

"Even then we had hope. But in a week's time we were frozen into the main
pack, and there we have had to winter, and it is hardly a week since we
got clear by cutting a canal with our great ice-saws. Oh! it has been a
dreary time for us, but must have been more so to you, poor darlings! and
well and bravely you have borne it all!

"I am sure," he added, "that even Pansy has grown, and her mother will
hardly know her again when we all get home."

"We are going now, aren't we, 'Fessor Pete?" said Pansy, who was sitting
on his knee.

"Yes, my dear, yes. It is no use staying here when we have no steam, so
the ship is now making for England's sunny shores. And we'll get there in
the rosy month of June. Won't it be nice?"

Pansy was jumping with joy.

Aralia clapped her hands and cried: "Just too jolly for anything!"

By and by Aralia sat down to the piano, and Pete brought out his fiddle,
and a very happy evening indeed was spent in the _Valhalla_.

The men were keeping it up forward too, around the galley fire, singing