We soon had another bit of excitement; a few days later for a while we feared that we had lost our entire commissary department. Both Ah Sam and Tong Sing, armed with rifles, in the early afternoon went off hunting on the pack. When by seven at night they had not returned, we became not only hungry but alarmed, and sent out a searching party. At nine o’clock, they met the steward, Charley Tong Sing, coming in alone, to tell a very involved story. A few miles from the ship, as he related it, he and the cook had picked up a bear track and with visions of more fresh bear to work on for dinner, they started eagerly in pursuit, after some miles coming in sight of the bear, which to their joy they found was being worried along by two of our best dogs, Wolf and Prince.
The dogs seeing reenforcements at last coming up in the form of our two Chinamen, and all hunters looking alike to them, promptly brought the bear to a stand by heading him off and snapping at his nose.
Running forward to get in a shot, Charley unfortunately slipped amongst some broken ice, and a piece of it fell on his back, holding him down, or he positively asserted, he would have killed the bear. Thus hors de combat, he lay while the dogs, no doubt thoroughly disgusted at such inexpert support, let the bear get underway again. By the time Ah Sam had managed to pry the ice off Charley and release him, neither bear nor dogs was in sight.
It being now at least six o’clock, both cook and steward came suddenly to the realization that aboard ship, chow was way past due and held a council of war, the upshot of which was that the cook as senior officer present, ordered the steward to return to both cook and serve dinner while he, the cook, kept on to bag the bear. So there, safely back, was Charley Tong Sing, but where was our cook and where were our two best dogs?
De Long, having finally digested (instead of his dinner) this story in excited pidgin English of ice, bears, dogs, and Chinamen, looked at his executive officer in dismay. It was now dark, with considerable wind and drifting snow.
“Shall I send the searching party out again, sir?” asked Chipp.
“What the use?” queried the harassed skipper. “A bear chased by dogs chased by a cook is too pressed for time to steer a proper compass course, so where should we look?”
We waited and worried till midnight, when that fear at least was allayed as Ah Sam, thoroughly exhausted, came stumbling up the gangway, and a more completely demoralized Chinaman you could never find. De Long personally made him drink half a tumblerful of whiskey to bring him round, but he was completely incoherent and began to cry. When at last he was calmed a little, he related how he had continued to chase the bear, which the two dogs to give him a chance, by fierce attacks managed occasionally to stop for a minute or two but never for long enough for him to get within range. The dogs, Prince and Wolf, fighting desperately this way as the bear retreated, were both bleeding. Ah Sam says he followed the bear on a southerly course fifteen miles, determined to get him if he had to chase him all the way to China. Then by a particularly vicious onslaught, the dogs finally succeeded in holding the bear till Ah Sam could run up close enough for a fine shot. Raising his rifle, our cook took careful aim on the bear’s head, and pressed the trigger, when horror of horrors, instead of hurting the bear, the rifle exploded in his hands! His morale completely shattered, poor Ah Sam sat down in the snow and wept, while the bear, still accompanied by Wolf and Prince, amazed no doubt by such weird hunting, but unwilling to give up, moved on over the pack and that was the last he saw of any of them. Still weeping, Ah Sam picked up the remains of his rifle and started home. How he ever found the ship again, he didn’t know; it had taken him, walking continuously, until midnight. And there, indicating it with a hysterical wave of his hand, as proof of this wild story was the treacherous rifle!
We examined it curiously. Ah Sam had not exaggerated—the gun barrel was torn to pieces; only a half length, cracked open, being left still attached to the stock. But to anyone used to firearms, the answer was simple. Ah Sam, in his long chase, must have let the muzzle slip into a snowdrift; the snow freezing solidly in the bore, had plugged it off, with the natural result that when he fired, there being no proper release for the exploding powder, it had promptly blown off the muzzle.
Dr. Ambler examined Ah Sam carefully for wounds; it seemed a miracle one of those flying rifle fragments had not cut his head off. But physically he had escaped unscathed; his demoralization was wholly mental, owing to the way, in his efforts to provide roast bear for dinner, an unkind fate had treated him. Still weeping, poor Ah Sam was led off to his bunk.