The Field of Ice Page 9

  AN EXCURSION TO THE NORTH OF VICTORIA BAY

  Next morning Clawbonny was out by dawn of day. Clambering up thesteep, rocky wall, against which the Doctor's House leaned, hesucceeded, though with considerable difficulty, in reaching the top,which he found terminated abruptly in a sort of truncated cone. Fromthis elevation there was an extensive view over a vast tract ofcountry, which was all disordered and convulsed as if it hadundergone some volcanic commotion. Sea and land, as far as it waspossible to distinguish one from the other, were covered with asheet of ice.

  A new project struck the Doctor's mind, which was soon matured andripe for execution. He lost no time in going back to the snow house,and consulting over it with his companions.

  "I have got an idea," he said; "I think of constructing alighthouse on the top of that cone above our heads."

  "A lighthouse!" they all exclaimed.

  "Yes, a lighthouse. It would be a double advantage. It would be abeacon to guide us in distant excursions, and also serve to illumineour plateau in the long dreary winter months."

  "There is no doubt," replied Altamont, "of its utility; buthow would you contrive to make it?"

  "With one of the lanterns out of the Porpoise."

  "All right; but how will you feed your lamp? With seal oil?"

  "No, seal oil would not give nearly sufficient light. It wouldscarcely be visible through the fog."

  "Are you going to try to make gas out of our coal then?"

  "No, not that either, for gas would not be strong enough; and,worse still, it would waste our combustibles."

  "Well," replied Altamont; "I'm at a loss to see how you--"

  "Oh, I'm prepared for everything after the mercury bullet, andthe ice lens, and Fort Providence. I believe Mr. Clawbonny can doanything," exclaimed Johnson.

  "Come, Clawbonny, tell us what your light is to be, then," saidAltamont.

  "That's soon told," replied Clawbonny. "I mean to have anelectric light."

  "An electric light?"

  "Yes, why not? Haven't you a galvanic battery on board yourship?"

  "Yes."

  "Well, there will be no difficulty then in producing an electriclight, and that will cost nothing, and be far brighter."

  "First-rate?" said Johnson; "let us set to work at once."

  "By all means. There is plenty of material. In an hour we canraise a pillar of ice ten feet high, and that is quite enough.

  Away went the Doctor, followed by his companions, and the column wassoon erected and crowned with a ship lantern. The conducting wireswere properly adjusted within it, and the pile with which theycommunicated fixed up in the sitting-room, where the warmth of thestove would protect it from the action of the frost.

  As soon as it grew dark the experiment was made, and proved acomplete success. An intense brilliant light streamed from thelantern and illumined the entire plateau and the plains beneath.

  Johnson could not help clapping his hands, half beside himself withdelight.

  "Well, I declare, Mr. Clawbonny," he exclaimed, "you're oursun now."

  "One must be a little of everything, you know," wasClawbonny's modest reply.

  It was too cold. however, even to stand admiring more than a minute,and the whole party were glad enough to get indoors again, and tuckthemselves up in their warm blankets.

  A regular course of life commenced now, though uncertain weather andfrequent changes of temperature made it sometimes impracticable toventure outside the hut at all, and it was not till the Saturdayafter the installation, that a day came that was favourable enoughfor a hunting excursion; when Bell, and Altamont, and the Doctordetermined to take advantage of it, and try to replenish their stockof provisions.

  They started very early in the morning, each armed with adouble-barrelled gun and plenty of powder and shot, a hatchet, and asnow knife.

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  The weather was cloudy, but Clawbonny put the galvanic battery inaction before he left, and the bright rays of the electric light didduty for the glorious orb of day, and in truth was no badsubstitute, for the light was equal to three thousand candles, orthree hundred gas burners.

  It was intensely cold, but dry, and there was little or no wind. Thehunters set off in the direction of Cape Washington, and the hardsnow so favoured their march, that in three hours they had gonefifteen miles, Duk jumping and barking beside them all the way. Theykept as close to the coast as possible, but found no trace of humanhabitation and indeed scarcely a sign of animal life. A few snowbirds, however, darting to and fro announced the approach of springand the return of the animal creation. The sea was still entirelyfrozen over, but it was evident from the open breathing holes in theice, that the seals had been quite recently on the surface. In onepart the holes were so numerous, that the Doctor said to hiscompanions that he had no doubt that when summer came, they would beseen there in hundreds, and would be easily captured, for onunfrequented shores they were not so difficult of approach. But oncefrighten them and they all vanish as if by enchantment, and neverreturn to the spot again. "Inexperienced hunters," he said,"have often lost a whole shoal by attacking them, en masse, withnoisy shouts instead of singly and silently."

  "Is it for the oil or skin that they are mostly hunted?"

  "Europeans hunt them for the skin, but the Esquimaux eat them.They live on seals, and nothing is so delicious to them as a pieceof the flesh, dipped in the blood and oil. After all, cooking has agood deal to do with it, and I'll bet you something I could dressyou cutlets you would not turn up your nose at, unless for theirblack appearance."

  "We'll set you to work on it," said Bell, "and I'll eat asmuch as you like to please you."

  "My good Bell, you mean to say to please yourself, but yourvoracity would never equal the Green-landers', for they devourfrom ten to fifteen pounds of meat a day."

  "Fifteen pounds!" said Bell. "What stomachs!"

  "Arctic stomachs," replied the Doctor, "are prodigious; theycan expand at will, and, I may add, contract at will; so that theycan endure starvation quite as well as abundance. When an Esquimauxsits down to dinner he is quite thin, and by the time he hasfinished, he is so corpulent you would hardly recognize him. Butthen we must remember that one meal sometimes has to last a wholeday."

  "This voracity must be peculiar to the inhabitants of coldcountries," said Altamont.

  "I think it is," replied the Doctor. "In the Arctic regionspeople must eat enormously: it is not only one of the conditions ofstrength, but of existence. The Hudson's Bay Company alwaysreckoned on this account 8 lbs. of meat to each man a day, or 12lbs. of fish, or 2 lbs. of pemmican."

  "Invigorating regimen, certainly!" said Bell.

  "Not so much as you imagine, my friend. An Indian who guzzles likethat can't do a whit better day's work than an Englishman, whohas his pound of beef and pint of beer."

  "Things are best as they are, then, Mr. Clawbonny."

  "No doubt of it; and yet an Esquimaux meal may well astonish us.In Sir John Ross's narrative, he states his surprise at theappetites of his guides. He tells us that two of them--just twomind--devoured a quarter of a buffalo in one morning. They cut themeat in long narrow strips, and the mode of eating was either forthe one to bite off as much as his mouth could hold, and then passit on to the other, or to leave the long ribbons of meat danglingfrom the mouth and devour them gradually like boa-constrictors,lying at full length on the ground."

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  "Faugh!" exclaimed Bell, "what disgusting brutes!"

  "Every man has his own fashion of dining," remarked thephilosophical American.

  "Happily," said the Doctor.

  "Well, if eating is such an imperative necessity in theselatitudes, it quite accounts for all the journals of Arctictravellers being so full of eating and drinking."

  "You are right," returned the Doctor. "I have been struck bythe same fact; but I think it arises not only from the necessity offull diet, but from the extreme difficulty sometimes in procuringit. The thought of food is always uppermost in the
mind, andnaturally finds mention in the narrative."

  "And yet," said Altamont, "if my memory serves me right, inthe coldest parts of Norway the peasants do not seem to need suchsubstantial fare. Milk diet is their staple food, with eggs, andbread made of the bark of the birch-tree; a little salmonoccasionally, but never meat; and still they are fine hardyfellows."

  "It is an affair of organization out of my power to explain,"replied Clawbonny; "but I have no doubt that if these sameNorwegians were transplanted to Greenland, they would learn to eatlike the Esquimaux by the second or third generation. Even if weourselves were to remain in this blessed country long, we should beas bad as the Esquimaux, even if we escaped becoming regulargluttons."

  "I declare, Mr. Clawbonny, you make me feel hungry with talking somuch about eating," exclaimed Bell.

  "Not I!" said Altamont. "It rather sickens me, and makes meloathe the sight of a seal. But, stop, I do believe we are going tohave the chance of a dinner off one, for I am much mistaken ifthat's not something alive lying on those lumps of ice yonder!"

  "It is a walrus!" exclaimed the Doctor. "Be quiet, and let usget up to him."

  Clawbonny was right, it was a walrus of huge dimensions, disportinghimself not more than two hundred yards away. The hunters separated,going in different directions, so as to surround the animal and cutoff all retreat. They crept along cautiously behind the hummocks,and managed to get within a few paces of him unperceived, when theyfired simultaneously.

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  The walrus rolled over, but speedily got up again, and tried to makehis escape, but Altamont fell upon him with his hatchet, and cut offhis dorsal fins. He made a desperate resistance, but was overpoweredby his enemies, and soon lay dead, reddening the ice-field with hisblood.

  It was a fine animal, measuring more than fifteen feet in length,and would have been worth a good deal for the oil; but the hunterscontented themselves with cutting off the most savoury parts, andleft the rest to the ravens, which had just begun to make theirappearance.

  Night was drawing on, and it was time to think of returning to FortProvidence. The moon had not yet risen, but the sky was serene andcloudless, and already glittering with stars--magnificent stars.

  "Come," said the Doctor, "let us be off, for it is gettinglate. Our hunting has not been very successful; but still, if a manhas found something for his supper, he need not grumble. Let us gothe shortest road, however, and get quickly home without losing ourway. The stars will guide us."

  They resolved to try a more direct route back by going furtherinland, and avoiding the windings of the coast; but, after somehours' walking, they found themselves no nearer Doctor's House,and it was evident that they must have lost their way. The questionwas raised whether to construct a hut and rest till morning, orproceed; but Clawbonny insisted on going on, as Hatteras and Johnsonwould be so uneasy.

  "Duk will guide us," he said; "he won't go wrong. Hisinstinct can dispense with star and compass. Just let us keep closebehind him."

  They did well to trust to Duk, for very speedily a faint lightappeared in the horizon almost like a star glimmering through themist, which hung low above the ground.

  "There's our lighthouse!" exclaimed the Doctor.

  "Do you think it is, Mr. Clawbonny?" said Bell.

  Soon they were walking in a bright luminous track,leaving their long shadows behind them on the spotless snow. --P.87]

  "I'm certain of it! Come on faster." The light became strongerthe nearer they approached, and soon they were walking in a brightluminous track, leaving their long shadows behind them on thespotless snow.

  Quickening their steps, they hastened forward, and in another halfhour they were climbing the ascent to Fort Providence.

  CHAPTER IX.