The old Scotch engineer looked at him queerly.

"Oh, ay," he sniffed, "and some day we'll all go to sea in pea-soup
bowls nae doot."

"Well, a man in Connecticut has built a schooner out of cement,"
declared Harry.

The engineer looked at him and slowly wiped his hands on a bit of
waste.

"I ken his head must be a muckle thicker nor that," was his comment,
at which both the boys laughed as they climbed the steel ladders that
led from the warm and oily regions to the deck. The engineer, with a
"dour" Scot's grin, gazed after them.

"Hoots-toots," he muttered to his gauges and levers, "the great ice
has a wonderful way with lads as cocksure as them twa."




CHAPTER II.

A MYSTERIOUS ROBBERY.


Their inspection of the Southern Cross completed, the delighted boys
accompanied Captain Hazzard back to the main cabin, where he unfolded
before them a huge chart of the polar regions.