VERNON'S CURIOSITY Silky blue lines streaked the long undulations that ran back to the horizon and the _Flaminian_ rolled with a measured swing.

When her bows went down the shining swell broke with a dull roar and rainbows flickered in the spray about her forecastle; then, while the long deck got level, one heard the beat of engines and the grinding of screws.

A wake like an angry torrent foamed astern, and in the distance, where the dingy smoke-cloud melted, the crags of Labrador ran in faint, broken line.

Ahead an ice-floe glittered in the sun.

The liner had left Belle Isle Strait and was steaming towards Greenland on the northern Atlantic course.
Harry Vernon occupied a chair on the saloon-deck and read the _Montreal Star_ which had been sent on board at Rimouski.