Our case was different. We were a scientific group, not occupied with the capture of animal trophies and so we naturally saw a great deal of game.
It is difficult for me to set down the amazing amount of interesting live stock which flourished about us at every stage of our journey. In the lower latitudes these were the more familiar caribou, rabbits, wolves, and deer.
A sight I shall never forget was one which confronted us shortly after clearing the westernmost point of Wrangel Island. This was in the earlier stages of our journey while we still enjoyed a few hours of restful darkness. Through the murky night I heard a low muttering sound with an occasional note of complaint or discontent. The noise was not single and distinct but vast and widespread as if a large area of land had become vocal. "What do you suppose is wrong?" I asked Triplett with whom I was keeping watch. "There's allus somethin' wrong on Wrangel," said that worthy imperturbably. But I could see that he was interested for he kept his good-eye alternately on our compass and the dim bulk of land that loomed on our quarter.
Dawn came on apace and a marvellous picture lay before us. Far into the interior, on the snowy slopes, were millions of reindeer feeding on the Christmas trees which do so well in this locality. The noise I had heard was the swishing of great branches and the guttural grunts of these picturesque mammals as they devoured their provender. Others of my men had stolen on deck and stood silently watching. Frissell was greatly excited.
"Who said there wasn't any Santa Claus!" he cried, and at the sound of his voice the huge herd tossed its broad-leaved antlers and rushed madly toward the distant horizon while Frizzie urged them on with cries of "Now, Vixen, now, Dasher!" It was an odd but interesting scene.
The Arctic hares were not as numerous as I have seen them on my previous northern trips and those I observed through my glasses were of poor quality and sickly physique. Evidently the gradual dying out of the lapland lark-spurs, which are the natural cover of the hares, has worked havoc among these charming creatures.[11]
But now, beyond eighty-six, we had left behind us these semi-domestic creatures and were among the truly Arctic animals, those weird denizens of berg and floe which civilization sees only in zoological gardens or vaudeville performances. From my station near the forepeak I swept the horizon hourly with my glasses cataloguing the myriad species of Arctic life and entering them in my journal with notes as to quantity, quality and other attributes which had a bearing on the commercial or scientific value of the type referred to. I can give no better idea of this sportsman's paradise than by quoting a few extracts from the volume.
INTENSIVE OPTIMISM
As long as brave deeds are recognized and heroic fortitude receives its just due the name of Reginald Whinney will shine forth in letters of gold. Reference is made in the text to his tragic attack of snow-blindness on the very eve of the arrival of Dr. Traprock (and party) at the Pole. This untoward visitation (by which we mean Whinney's affliction, not the Traprock Expedition), would in itself have been enough to break the heart of any ordinary man, but not the heart of a Whinney. To such as he adversity is as the sunshine to the flower or the flower to the bee, a new source of inspiration and sweetness.
In the early days of his blindness he was, of course, greatly depressed. "I am put out but not crushed" was his simple comment. Having recourse to his typewriter he recorded that touching paraphrase of Milton ending with the line, "They also serve who only sit and type." Then came the magnificent "Ode to the Aurora," after which the sun of his vision seemed to burst through the walls of his temporary night. Full of sparkling wit and joyous laughter he fully earned his soubriquet of "Sunbeam-of-the-North." Even before breakfast he was mirth personified; in the evening, he was irrepressible. The Eskimos found in him a source of inexhaustible wonder. To a race living far beyond the sound of a songbird his carollings were nothing short of a miracle.
Dr. Traprock has confessed that at times his friend's gaiety was trying. During the frightful sufferings of the return journey, for instance, it was upsetting to face starvation and death to the accompaniment of "I love a lassie," warbled by the stricken scientist from the forepeak. But as the Doctor acutely remarks, "How unjust to condemn a man who was doing the only thing left for him to do, namely, trying to cheer us up. Moreover I knew that his optimism was but blind. Incessant cheerfulness, when sincere, is impossible to stand; I can enjoy it when I know that it masks a broken heart."
