“There was one thing very curious and beautiful about our iceberg,” said Beechnut.  “We came in sight of it one day about sunset, just after a shower.  The cloud, which was very large and black, had passed off into the west, and there was a splendid rainbow upon it.  It happened, too, that when we were nearest to the iceberg it lay toward the west, and, of course, toward the cloud, and it appeared directly under the rainbow, and the iceberg and the rainbow made a most magnificent spectacle.  The iceberg, which was very bright and dazzling in the evening sun, looked like an enormous diamond, with the rainbow for the setting.”

“How curious!” said Phonny.

“Yes,” said Beechnut, “and to make it more remarkable still, a whale just then came along directly before the iceberg, and spouted there two or three times; and as the sun shone very brilliantly upon the jet of water which the whale threw into the air, it made a sort of silver rainbow below in the center of the picture.”

“How beautiful it must have been!” said Phonny.

“Yes,” rejoined Beechnut, “very beautiful indeed.  We saw a great many beautiful spectacles on the sea; but then, on the other hand, we saw some that were dreadful.

“Did you?” asked Phonny.  “What?”

“Why, we had a terrible storm and shipwreck at the end,” said Beechnut.  “For three days and three nights the wind blew almost a hurricane.  They took in all the sails, and let the ship drive before the gale under bare poles.  She went on over the seas for five hundred miles, howling all the way like a frightened dog.”

“Were you frightened?” asked Phonny.

“Yes,” said Beechnut.  “When the storm first came on, several of the passengers came up the hatchways and got up on the deck to see it; and then we could not get down again, for the ship gave a sudden pitch just after we came up, and knocked away the step-ladder.  We were terribly frightened.  The seas were breaking over the forecastle and sweeping along the decks, and the shouts and outcries of the captain and the sailors made a dreadful din.  At last they put the step-ladder in its place again, and we got down.  Then they put the hatches on, and we could not come out any more.”

“The hatches?” said Phonny.  “What are they?”

“The hatches,” replied Beechnut, “are a sort of scuttle-doors that cover over the square openings in the deck of a ship.  They always have to put them on and fasten them down in a great storm.”

Just at this time the party happened to arrive at a place where two roads met, and as there was a broad and level space of ground at the junction, where it would be easy to turn the wagon, Beechnut said that he thought it would be better to make that the end of their ride, and so turn round and go home.  Phonny and Madeline were quite desirous of going a little farther, but Beechnut thought that he should be tired by the time he reached the house again.