True Tales of Arctic Heroism in the New World

by A. W. Greely

However, the bitter wind did good and needful work, for in time it packed into marble-like drifts the autumnal snows. This gave work for native snow-knife and deft hands, which soon erected two large snow houses, on the southerly side of Beacon Hill, where they were well sheltered from the prevailing northwesterly gales.

With Indian inclinations to idleness, some of the men looked forward eagerly to the completion of the snow houses. They were viewed as comfortable places for the long winter, where the cheerful pipe, with tales of the trail and ample food, should make content the trapper's heart and body. Rae had no such notion, for he had lived too long with natives and with half-breeds not to know that daily work was needful not only for the health, but even more for the morale and efficiency of his men.

Finding that the fish-nets of the lake were much cut up by a small, shrimp-like water insect, the favorite food of the salmon, he transferred them to the rapids of North Pole River, which kept open nearly all winter. Some of the men made the six-mile tramp across the rough country to daily drag the nets, while the rest kept the field where an occasional fox, wolf, partridge, or wolverine rewarded their efforts.

After a time there was much grumbling at days of fruitless hunting. Rae was equal to the occasion, and he set the discontented hunters at work scraping under the snow for saxifrage, their sole supply of fuel. To complaints he tersely said: "No saxifrage, no tea." Only men familiar with the white north know what a deprivation it would have been to these half-breeds to give up the hot tea, which they daily look forward to with intense longing and drink with deep satisfaction.

With midwinter past and the sun returned, Rae welcomed with relief the first sign of the far-distant but longed-for arctic spring. Of course, with lengthening days came strengthening cold, and there were weeks during which the mercury was frozen—the true arctic days of no wind, of bright skies, and of beautiful colors in air and on ice.

One day the youngest of the Indians burst into the snow house, crying out in great terror that the clouds were on fire. While the older men rushed out instantly, the phlegmatic Scot followed at leisure. It proved to be an offshoot of one of the brilliant sun-dogs which so wondrously beautify the arctic heavens, especially in the early spring or late winter. These sun-dogs, or mock-suns, arise from refraction and reflection of the solar rays of light from the ice particles that are suspended in the air, and are usually at twenty-two or forty-five degrees distant from the sun itself.

On this occasion the sun-dogs had formed behind a thin, transparent cirrus cloud which greatly extended the area of the sun-dog besides adding very greatly to its already vivid colors. Rae tells us that "three fringes of pink and green followed the outlines of the cloud." The alarm and mistake of the young novice in sun-dogs and solar halos were sources of gibes and fun among his chaffing comrades for many days.

Rae now began his preparations for field work. A snow hut was put up for the use of the carpenter, who was soon busy overhauling the sledge gear. The Hudson Bay sledges were carefully taken apart, scraped, polished, reduced in weight as far as was safe, and then put together with the utmost care so that the chance of a break-down in the field should be reduced to a minimum. The trade articles for use with the Eskimos were gone over and so arranged as to give the greatest variety for use in the field with the least weight. Everything was to be hauled by man-power and the weights must be as small as possible. Beads, files, knives, thimbles, fish-hooks, needles, and chisels were thought to be the best suited to native needs and tastes.

Meanwhile, Rae was disturbed that no signs of Eskimos had been found in their local field journeys. He feared that their absence might mean that there had been a change of route on the part of the reindeer in their migratory paths, for in that region no game meant no inhabitants. Several efforts to locate natives near the fishing-points were made without success. The doctor then put into the field two of his best men, Thomas Mistegan, the deer-hunter, "a trusty, pushing fellow," as we are told, and William Ouglibuck, the Eskimo interpreter of the party. Their journey of several days to Ross Bay showed that the country was bare of natives, but here and there were seen a number of deer migrating to the north, and of these a few were shot. This journey was most disappointing in its results for Rae had hoped to find Eskimos from whom he could buy a few dogs for sledge work.