The bottom came no nearer, and the Dipsey moved cautiously on.

Nobody thought of eating; they did not talk much, but at every one of the outlooks there were eager faces.
At last they saw nothing above them but floating fragments of ice.

Still they kept on, until they were plainly moving below the surface of open water.

Then Mr.Gibbs looked at Sammy.
"I think it is time to rise," said he; and Sammy passed the word that the Dipsey was going up into the upper air.
When the little craft, so long submerged in the quiet depths of the Arctic Sea, had risen until she rested on the surface of the water, there was no general desire, as there had been when she emerged into Lake Shiver, to rush upon the upper deck.

Instead of that, the occupants gathered together and looked at each other in a hesitating way, as if they were afraid to go out and see whether they were really in an open sea, or lying in some small ice-locked body of water.
Mr.Gibbs was very pale.
"My friends," said he, "we are going on deck to find out whether or not we have reached the open polar sea, but we must not be excited, and we must not jump to hurried conclusions; we may have found what we are in search of, and we may not have found it yet.