CHAPTER XLIV.
THE WONDERFUL DRIFT.
EARLY in November Captain Tyson saw through his glass, about twelve miles off to the southeast, the Cary Islands, so they were in the "North water" of Baffin Bay, and south-west from Cape Parry, where we have been so many times. From this cape, or a little south of it, it would not be a great sledge trip to where they last saw the "Polaris," and where they had reason to think she now was. So our party made one more effort to reach the shore. The boats being in readiness the night before, they started early in the morning. Of course their day was now only a noon twilight, and the morning was most midday. But the floe was not in a favoring mood. The hummocks were as hard in their usage of the boats and men as usual. The deceitful cracks in the ice at one time put the lives of the dogs and men in great peril; and, as if these obstacles were not enough, a storm brought up its forces against them. They had dragged the boats half way to the shore when they retreated "before superior forces."
Their huts being of perishable material, were reconstructed. A little later the men built a large snow hut as "a reserve." All were weak through insufficient food. Mr. Meyers was nearly prostrate, and went to live with the men; Captain Tyson, whose scanty clothing, added to care and short rations, caused him to suffer much, took up his quarters with Joe and Hannah, and their little Puney. Not the least of the trial in the Esquimo huts were the piteous cries of the children for food. Joe and Hans were out with their guns every day during the three hours' twilight, hunting seals. The first one captured was shot by Joe, November sixth. Nearly two weeks passed before any further success attended the hunters; then several were shot, and Captain Tyson, who was ready to perish, had one full meal—a meal of uncooked seal meat, skin, hair, and all, washed down with seal blood. Some others had not been so long without a full meal, as the bread continued to be stolen.
The home Thanksgiving Day came. A little extra amount of the canned meat was allowed each one, and all had a taste of mock-turtle soup and canned green corn, kept for this occasion, to which was added a few pieces of dried apple. How far it all fell short of the home feast may be judged by the fact that Captain Tyson, to satisfy the fierce hunger which remained after dinner, finished "with eating strips of frozen seals' entrails, and lastly seal skin, hair and all."
The hunters had seen tracks of bears, so they were on the lookout for them while they hunted seal. One day Joe and Hans went out as usual with their guns. They lost sight of each other and of the camp. Joe returned quite late, expecting to find Hans already in his hut. When he learned that he had not returned, he, as well as others, felt concerned about him. Accompanied by one of the men, he went in search of him. As the two, guns in hand, were stumbling over the hummocks, they saw in the very dim twilight, as they thought, a bear. Their guns were instantly leveled and brought to the sight, and their mouths almost tasted a bear-meat supper. "Hold on there! That's not a bear! what is it?" "Why, it's Hans!" Well, he did look in the darkness like a bear, as in his shaggy coat he clambered, on all-fours, over the ice-hills.
December came in with its continuous night. Seals could not be successfully hunted in the darkness, and where seals could not be seen bears would not make their appearance. The rations became smaller than ever, and ghastly, horrid starvation seemed encamped among our drifting, forlorn party. Under these circumstances a specter even worse than starvation appeared to Joe. To him, at least, it was a terrifying reality. It was the demon form of Cannibalism! He had looked into the eyes of the men in the big hut, and they spoke to him of an intention to save themselves by first killing and eating Hans and family, and then taking him and his. He and Hannah were greatly terrified, and he handed his pistol to Captain Tyson, which he was not willing to part with before. He was assured that the least child should not be touched for so horrid a purpose without such a defense as the pistol could give.
Christmas came. The last ham had been kept for this occasion, and it was divided among all, with a few other dainties, in addition to the usual morsel.
The shore occasionally appeared in the far away distance. They were drifting through Baffin Bay toward the western side, so that their craft evidently did not intend to land them at any of the familiar ports of Greenland. It seemed to have an ambition to drop them nearer home.
As the year was going out, and Joe's family were gnawing away at some dried seal skin, submitted, to be sure, to a process Hannah called cooking, a shout was heard from him. "Kayak! kayak!" he cried. He had shot a seal, and it was floating away. Fortunately the kayak was at hand, and the game was bagged. As usual, it was divided among all. The eyes were given to Charlie Polaris, and they were nice in his eyes, and mouth, too.
New Year's came, and Captain Tyson dined on two feet of frozen seal entrails, and a little seal fat. There was now nothing to burn except what little seal blubber they could spare for that purpose. One boat had been burned, their only sled had gone the same way, and the reckless, desperate men could hardly be restrained from burning the only one now remaining, and thus cut off all good hope of final escape. To be sure, their provocation to this act was very great; the temperature was thirty-six below zero! In their strait, the desperate expedient was entertained of trying to get to land. The emaciated men would have to drag the loaded boat over the hummocky ice without a sledge. The women and children must be added to the load or abandoned. It would be a struggle for life against odds more fearful than that which now oppressed them. But what should they do! God knew! Hark! what shout is that! "Kayak! kayak!" The kayak was at hand, but it had to be carried a mile. Yet it paid, for a seal shot by Joe was secured just in time to keep the men from utter desperation. To this item of comfort another was added a few days later. The sun reappeared January nineteenth, after an absence of eighty-three days, and remained shining upon them two hours. He brought hope to fainting hearts. Through January there was a seal taken at long intervals, but one always came just before it was too late! The men continued to grumble and deceive themselves with the idea of soon getting to Disco, "where rum and tobacco were plenty." How sad that man can sink below the brute, which, however hungry, never cries out for "rum and tobacco!"
Leaving for a moment the white men, let us look into the Esquimo huts and see how the terrible condition of things affects them. The men are almost always out hunting, but just now, as we step into Joe's snow dwelling, he is at home. The only light or fire is that which comes from the scanty supply of seal oil. Captain Tyson is trying to write with a pencil in his journal, but he appears cold in his scanty covering of furs, and looks weak and hungry. Joe and Hannah are striving to pass away the weary hours by playing checkers on an old piece of canvas which the captain has marked into squares with his pencil. They are using buttons for men, and seem quite interested in the game. Little Puney is sitting by, wrapped in a musk-ox skin, uttering at intervals a low, plaintive cry for food. It is the most cheerful home "on board" the floe, but surely it is cheerless enough.
We shall not wish to tarry long in the hut of Hans, for besides the unavoidable misery of the place, Mr. and Mrs. Hans are noted for the boarders they keep—about their persons. Under the most favorable circumstances they regard bathing as one of the barbarous customs of civilization. The reader will recollect that the first experience Mrs. Hans had of a personal cleansing was on board Dr. Hayes's vessel, and she then thought it a joke imposed by the white people's religion, too grievous to be borne. On another exploring vessel she and her husband were cruelly required to put off their long-worn garments, wash and put on clean ones, and put the old "in a strong pickle," for an obvious reason. It is not certainly known that they were ever washed at any other times.
Mrs. Hans's hut is not in the most tidy order, but the circumstances must be taken into the account, and also the fact of the sad neglect of her early domestic education. We have just drifted from her native land—or, rather, ice—where she was married, in Dr. Kane's time, it being a runaway match, at least on the part of the husband.
Well, here they are, father, mother, and four children, on a voyage unparalleled in the history of navigation. Mr. and Mrs. Hans do not play any household games; they do not know what to do at home, except to eat, and feed the children, and make and mend skin clothing. We know full well to what sad disadvantage the eating is subjected at the time of our call, and we are authorized to say, to the credit of Mrs. Hans, that as to the making and mending, she has been of real service to the men on this voyage.
The children of Hans cannot fail to attract our attention and sympathy. Augustina, the first-born, usually fat and rugged if not ruddy, is thin and pale now, and sits chewing a bit of dried seal skin, or something of the sort, and trying to get from it a drop of nourishment; her brother, Tobias, has thrown his head into her lap as she sits on the ground. The poor little fellow has been sick, unable to eat even the small allowance of meat given him, and has lived, one hardly knows how, on a little dry bread. Succi, the four-year-old girl, squats on the ground—that is, the canvas-covered ice floor—hugging her fur skin about her, and in a low, moaning tone repeats, "I is so hungry!" Her mother is trying to pick from the lamp, for the children, a few bits of "tried-out" scraps of blubber. Little Charlie's head is just discernible in the fur hood which hangs from the mother's neck at her back. If he gets enough to eat, which we fear is not the case, he is sweetly ignorant of the perils of this, his first trip, in the voyage of life. We shall not want to stay longer in this sad place.
February was a dreadful month on board the floe. The huts were buried under the snow. It was with difficulty that Joe and Hans, almost the entire dependence of the party, could go abroad for game, and when they did they secured a few seals only, very small, and now and then a dovekie, a wee bit of a pensive sea-bird. Norwhal, the sea unicorn, were shot in several instances, but they sunk in every case and were lost. Hunger and fear seemed to possess the men in the large tent, and Joe and Hannah began to be again terrified by the thought that these hunger-mad men would kill and eat them.
Now, will not God appear to help those in so helpless a condition? Yes, his hand has ever been wonderfully apparent in all Arctic perils. On the second of March, just when the dark cloud of these drifting sufferers was never darker, it parted, and a flood of light burst upon their camp. Joe shot an oogjook, belonging to the largest species of seal. He was secured and dragged by all hands to the huts. He measured nine feet, weighed about seven hundred pounds, and contained, by estimation, thirty gallons of oil. There was a shout of seal in the camp! The warm blood was relished like new milk, and drank freely. All eat and slept, and woke to eat again, and hunger departed for the time from the miserable huts it had so long haunted. Joe and Hannah dismissed their horrid visions of cannibalism. God was, the helper of these hungry ones, and they were helped.