Deep Sea Hunters in the Frozen Seas

by A. Hyatt Verrill

Then followed days filled with constant novelty, interest, and delight for the two boys. They went with the Eskimos on hunts for seal, and learned to find the blow holes in the ice through which the creatures came up to breathe. With their snow knives they cut great rectangular slabs of frozen snow and placed them upright near the holes as windbreaks, and with rifles grasped in their fur-gloved hands, and warm as toast in their eider skin undergarments and sealskin costumes, they lay upon the surface of the frozen bay and watched the holes while the wind swept downward from the North Pole, and the thermometer dropped to many degrees below zero. Often their vigil would gain them nothing. But many times a big hooded seal, a sheeny silversides, or a magnificent harp seal would fall a victim to their rifles. Much of their time too they spent in their igloo which they had fitted up exactly like those of their Eskimo neighbors, with skins and furs covering the bench of ice around the sides, a soapstone lamp filled with whale oil, with a moss wick to give light and heat, and with their weapons and trophies scattered about. From one of the natives they had purchased a team of dogs. Unavik had made them a sledge, and after many trials, unending merriment, countless upsets, and getting hopelessly tangled, the two boys had learned to drive their huskies fairly well. There was nothing they loved better than to go sledding over the frozen snow, yelling at their dogs, cracking their long whips, and now and then leaping on to the vehicle and traveling like the wind through the frosty stinging air lit by the pale winter sun or the gorgeous Aurora.

Much time also they spent in the Eskimos’ igloos and, their first squeamishness at the dirt and filth of the people being overcome, they found them very pleasant and good company. Sometimes, as a blizzard howled outside, and the dogs cowered whimpering at the mouth of the entrance tunnel, the Eskimos would while away the hours telling stories. Some of these were very quaint, others were humorous and still others were almost poems with their vivid descriptive phrases and beautiful sentiments.

But the boys’ favorites were the folklore tales about the birds and animals they knew so well. Usually some chance remark or question of the boys would start the story and all would listen attentively while the gray-haired, wrinkled, old ananating (grandmother) would tell in story form why certain things were so. Once, for example, Jim was examining a reindeer skin and called Tom’s attention to the white rump and the stubby little tail. Amaluk, who was making a snow knife, glanced up. “Perhaps,” he said in the dialect the boys now understood perfectly, “Nepaluka will tell you how the reindeer lost their tails.”

“Do,” begged Tom, “tell us the story, Ananating.”

The old woman was busily mending a skin shirt, her near-sighted eyes close to her work, her clawlike fingers moving deftly as she plied the bone needle—for she alone of all the women still preferred the Eskimo needles to those of the white men.

“Ai ai!” she exclaimed. “The clothes are mended and my eyes are weary and perchance it may be well to tell of Amook and the reindeer.”

Laying aside the carefully mended shirt she leaned back among the thick bearskins and began.

“Many ages ago,” she said in her droning voice, “before the Eskimos first came to the land, all the reindeer were brown from head to foot and all wore bushy tails like the foxes. In those times lived a great anticoot (magician) named Amook and to him belonged all the animals and birds. And all the creatures roamed at will except the reindeer, for these Amook kept hidden in a great hole in the earth.

“Every day Amook would come from the hole and, after pulling a big stone over the entrance to his home, he would travel far and wide caring for his creatures. In those days the birds and animals were all one color, and when winter came and snow fell upon the land their brown bodies were plain to be seen and the creatures saw one another afar, so it was easy indeed for the owls and hawks to see the ptarmigan and kill them, and for the foxes and wolves to see the hares and devour them. At last so many were killed that Amook grew afraid that his live things would all be destroyed, and he would be left without food to eat or furs to make his clothes. So, being a magician, he made many spells, until at last, by touching the fur of an animal or the feathers of a bird, he could change the brown to white. Then, when the winter came, Amook would go forth and call the birds and the beasts together, and as they came at his call, he would stroke them with his hands, and they would go forth white and spotless. But soon Amook was again troubled, for when spring came and the snow melted and the rocks and moss were bare, the white creatures were like spots of snow upon the brown land and fell easy prey to their enemies. Then from far and near the birds and beasts flocked to their master and begged him to make them brown once more. So Amook made another spell in his hole under the earth, and when he came forth and touched the birds and the beasts, behold! they were changed from white to brown as before.