from under the ice that they'd been pinched up in and had
been crossing on foot for weeks."

"But what about the town?" I asked. "Did they get to the
town?"

"They did," said the captain, "and found inhabitants; 'twas an
awful condition of things. It appeared, as near as Gaffett could
express it, like a place where there was neither living nor dead.
They could see the place when they were approaching it by sea
pretty near like any town, and thick with habitations; but all at
once they lost sight of it altogether, and when they got close
inshore they could see the shapes of folks, but they never could
get near them,--all blowing gray figures that would pass along
alone, or sometimes gathered in companies as if they were watching.
The men were frightened at first, but the shapes never came near
them,--it was as if they blew back; and at last they all got bold
and went ashore, and found birds' eggs and sea fowl, like any wild
northern spot where creatures were tame and folks had never been,
and there was good water. Gaffett said that he and another man
came near one o' the fog-shaped men that was going along slow with
the look of a pack on his back, among the rocks, an' they chased
him; but, Lord! he flittered away out o' sight like a leaf the wind
takes with it, or a piece of cobweb. They would make as if they
talked together, but there was no sound of voices, and 'they acted
as if they didn't see us, but only felt us coming towards them,'
says Gaffett one day, trying to tell the particulars. They
couldn't see the town when they were ashore. One day the captain
and the doctor were gone till night up across the high land where
the town had seemed to be, and they came back at night beat out and