My Last Dog, “Kaifas”
“The day before yesterday, in the evening, we suddenly discovered a black hillock to the east. We examined it through the glass and it looked absolutely like a black rock emerging from the snows. It also somewhat exceeded the neighboring hummocks in height. I scrutinized it carefully from the highest ridge hereabouts, but could not make it out. I thought it too big to be only a piled-up hummock mixed with black ice or earthy matter, and I had never seen anything of the kind before. That it is an island seems highly improbable; for although we are certainly drifting, it remains in the same position in relation to us. We saw it yesterday, and see it still to-day in the same quarter. I think the most reasonable supposition is that it is an iceberg.
“No sooner does the horizon clear in the south than one of us may be seen taking his customary walk to the ‘watch-tower’ (a hummock beside the tent) to scan for land, sometimes with a glass, sometimes without it; but there is nothing to be seen but the same bare horizon.[10]
“Every day I take a turn round the ice in our neighborhood to see if the snow has decreased, but it always seems to be about the same, and sometimes I have moments of doubt as to whether it will clear away at all this summer. If not, our prospects will be more than dark. The best we can hope for will then be a winter somewhere or other on Franz Josef Land. But now the rain has come. It is pouring down the tent walls and dripping on the ice. Everything looks hopeful again, and we are picturing the delights of the autumn and winter at home.
“Wednesday, July 10th. It is a curious thing that now, when I really have something of a little more interest than usual to relate, I have less inclination to write than ever. Everything seems to become more and more indifferent. One longs only for one single thing, and still the ice is lying out there covered with impassable snow.
“But what was it I had to say? Oh yes, that we made ourselves such a good bed yesterday with bearskins under the bag; that we slept the clock round without knowing it, and I thought it was six in the morning when I turned out. When I came out of the tent I thought there was something remarkable about the position of the sun, and pondered over it for a little while, until I came to the conclusion that it was six in the evening, and that we had slumbered for twenty-two hours. We have not slept much of late, as we have been broken on the wheel, so to speak, by the snow-shoes we had to place under the bag, in order to keep it clear of the pools of water under us. The apologies for hair still existing here and there on the skin at the bottom of the bag do not afford much protection against the sharp edges of the snow-shoes.
“This beneficent rain continued the whole day on Saturday, doing away with a fair amount of snow, and we rejoice to hear it. To celebrate the good weather we determined to have chocolate for supper; otherwise we live entirely on our catch. We had the chocolate accordingly, and served with raw blubber it tasted quite excellent. It was the cause of a great disappointment, however, for after having looked forward immoderately to this, now so rare, treat, I managed clumsily to upset my whole cup, so that all the precious contents ran out over the ice. While I was lying waiting for a second cup—it was boiling over the train-oil lamp—‘Kaifas’ began to bark outside. Not doubting but that he had seen an animal, I jumped up to hurry off to the lookout hummock to scan the ice. Not a little surprised was I when I poked my head out of the tent door to see a bear come jogging up to the dogs and begin sniffing at ‘Kaifas.’ I sprang to the gun, which stood ready in the snow beside the tent, and pulled off the case, the bear meanwhile standing astonished and glaring at me. I sent it a ball through the shoulder and chest, certain that it would drop on the spot. It half staggered over, and then turned round and made off, and before I could extract a new cartridge from my pocket, which was full of everything else, was away among the hummocks. I could not get a shot at it where it was, and set off in pursuit. I had not gone many steps before we saw (Johansen had followed me) two more heads appearing a little way farther on. They belonged to two cubs, which were standing on their hind-legs and looking at their mother, who came reeling towards them, with a trail of blood behind her. Then off they went, all three, over a lane, and a wild chase began over plains and ridges and lanes and every kind of obstacle, but it made no difference to their pace. A wonderful thing this love of sport; it is like setting fire to a fuse. Where at other times it would be laborious work to get on at all, where one sinks to the knees in the snow, and where one would hesitate before choosing a way over the lane, let only the spark be kindled, and one clears every obstacle without thinking about it. The bear was severely wounded, and dragged her left fore-leg; she did not go fast, but always so fast that I had my work cut out to keep near her. The cubs ran round her in their solicitude, and generally a little way in front, as if to get her to come with them; they little knew what was the matter with her. Suddenly they all three looked back at me, as I was crashing after them as fast as I could. I had been within range many times, but the bear had had her hind quarters towards me, and when I fired I meant to be sure of making an end of her, as I only had three cartridges with me, one for each of them. At last, on the top of a huge hummock, I got a sight of her broadside on, and there, too, she dropped. The cubs hurried anxiously up to her when she fell—it made one sorry to see them—they sniffed at and pushed her, and ran round and round, at a loss what to do in their despair. Meanwhile I had put another cartridge in the rifle, and picked off the other cub as it was standing on a projection. It fell over the declivity with a growl, and down on to its mother. Still more frightened than before, the other cub hastened to its succor; but, poor thing, what could it do? While its brother rolled over, growling, it stood there looking sorrowfully sometimes at it, sometimes at the mother, who lay dying in a pool of blood. When I approached, it turned its head away indifferently; what did it care about me now? All its kindred, everything it held dear, lay there mutilated and destroyed. It no longer knew whither to go, and did not move from the spot. I went right up to it, and, with a spherical ball through the breast, it fell dead beside its mother.
“Johansen soon came up. A lane had detained him, so that he had lost ground. We opened the animals, took out the entrails, and then went back to the tent to fetch the sledges and dogs and proper flaying-knives. Our second cup of chocolate in the tent tasted very good after this interruption. When we had skinned and cut up the two bears we left them in a heap, covered over with the skins to protect the meat from the gulls; the third one we took back with us. The next day we fetched the others, and now have more meat food than we shall be able to consume, I hope. It is a good thing, though, that we can give the dogs as much raw meat as they will eat; they certainly require it. ‘Suggen,’ poor thing, is in a very bad way, and it is a question whether we can get any more work out of him. When we took him with us after the bears the first day, he could not walk, and we had to place him on the sledge; but then he howled so terrifically, as much as to say it was beneath his dignity to be transported in this way, that Johansen had to take him home again. The dogs seem to be attacked with a paralysis of the legs; they fall down, and have the greatest difficulty in rising. It has been the same with all of them, from ‘Gulen’ downward. ‘Kaifas,’ however, is as fresh and well as ever.
“It is remarkable how large these cubs were. I could hardly imagine that they were born this year, and should without hesitation have put them down as a year old if the she-bear had not been in milk, and it is hardly to be supposed that the cubs would suck for a year and a half. Those we shot by the Fram on November 4th last year were hardly half the size of these. It would seem as if the polar bear produces its young at different times of the year. In the paunches of the cubs were pieces of skin from a seal.
“Monday, July 15th. As we were working at the kayaks yesterday a Ross’s gull (Rhodostethia rosea) came flying by. It was a full-grown bird, and made a turn when just over us, showing its pretty rose-colored breast, and then disappeared again in the mist southward. On Thursday I saw another adult Ross’s gull, with a black ring round its neck; it came from the northeast, and flew in a southwesterly direction. Otherwise it is remarkable how all the birds have disappeared from here. The little auk is no longer to be seen or heard; the only birds are an ivory-gull now and then, and occasionally a fulmar.