[THE SKERRY OF SHRIEKS.]
I.
People live even within the Polar Circle, although grown-up folks are apt to think it a poor sort of life. But to boys the “land of the midnight sun” is a veritable paradise. Every season of the year has its own kind of sport; and as schoolmasters are rare birds so far north, the boys are to a great extent left to follow their own devices until they are old enough to be sent away to school in the cities. From morning till night the air is filled with a screaming host of birds, which whirl in through the fiords like an approaching snow-storm. The eider-ducks lie gently bobbing upon the water, the black surf-scoters dive in the surf and make short work of the young whiting, and the puffins sit in long soldier-like rows on the rocks, and plunge headlong into the sea at the first signal of danger. In this glorious region the fish and fowl from all quarters of the globe seem to have appointed an annual meeting about New Year’s; and the Norwegian peasants, who are dependent upon the inhabitants of the sea and the air for their living, are on the lookout for them, and hasten to the coast to give them a fitting reception.
Harry Winchester’s motive, however, for visiting the Arctic wonderland was quite a different one. He had made the acquaintance of the Birk boys during the previous summer, and he had struck up a warm friendship with one of them, named Magnus. His parents, who lived in New York, had permitted him to accept the invitation of Mr. Birk to spend the winter with his sons, and Harry was so completely fascinated with the sports and adventures which every day offered in abundance that he would have liked to prolong his stay indefinitely.
Hasselrud, the estate of the Birks, was a fine, old-fashioned mansion, which peeped out from the dense foliage of chestnut and maple trees. Mr. Birk conducted a large business in fish and lumber, and manned every year several boats and sent them to the Lofoten fisheries. His three sons, Olaf, Magnus, and Edwin, were brisk and courageous lads, who had been accustomed to danger from their earliest years, and could handle a gun and manage a sail as well as any man in that region. Olaf was nineteen years old, and wore the uniform of a midshipman in the navy, and by courtesy was styled lieutenant; Magnus, who was sixteen, was a fair-faced, curly-headed lad, with frank blue eyes, a straight, handsome nose, and a singular talent for getting into mischief. Edwin was but twelve years old; but, as he does not figure conspicuously in this narrative, there is no need of describing him. But altogether the most important person at Hasselrud, next to Mr. Birk, was Grim Hering-Luck, a hoary, bow-legged fisherman, who was Mr. Birk’s right-hand man and captain of his boat-guild. Grim had a stern, deep-wrinkled face, framed in a wreath of grayish whiskers. He had small, piercing eyes, and bushy, gray-sprinkled hair. On his head he wore a sou’wester. The seat and knees of his trousers and the elbows of his coat were adorned with great shiny patches of leather. The leathern girdle about his waist did not quite fulfil its duties as suspenders, but allowed the trousers to slip down on his hips, leaving some four inches of shirt visible under the border of the waistcoat. Grim was a gruff old customer, but it was commonly believed that his bark was worse than his bite. He liked the bright American boy better than he cared to confess, and therefore neglected no opportunity for quarrelling with him. In fact, everybody admired Harry’s enterprising spirit and was entertained by his lively talk. Olaf was fairly dazzled by his knowledge and experience of the world, and little Edwin copied his walk and his picturesque recklessness to the extent of his small ability; but among all the family there was no one who was more ardently attached to Harry than Magnus. The two were inseparable; from morning till night they roamed about together, setting traps for hares and ptarmigan, spearing trout in the shallows of the river, trawling for mackerel in the salt water, and sometimes tacking in and out of the fiord in a furious gale. At such times, however, they were sure to have Grim in the boat, and Grim was a capital man to have in a boat in case of an emergency. Thus they spent the beautiful autumn months until the November storms began to blow, the snow began to fall, and the air, when they looked out the fiord, was thick and the sky threatening. The great trees bent in agony and howled in the blast with voices of despair. Then Grim would begin to investigate and to mend the nets which hung in long festoons along the walls of the boat-houses, and, with his friendly grunt, he would say in reply to Magnus’ queries:
“Wal, Mester Yallertop, the Lord he looks out fer them as they look out fer themselves. He puts the cod in the sea, but I never heared of his puttin’ it in yer mouth fer ye. He made the land poor up here, but he made the sea rich, jest fer to make the average right in the end. He lets ye starve like a toothless rat if ye have a taste fer starvin’. But thar ain’t no call for anybody to starve here north, ef he can bait a hook and ain’t afeared of bein’ late to his funeral.”
“Being late to your own funeral, Grim!” Magnus would exclaim, in amazement; “how can a man be late to his funeral?”
“Wal, now, Mester Yallertop, that I’ll tell ye. Fur that ain’t no uncommon case here north. Suppose ye go out in the mornin’ with the fishin’ fleet, and it blows up right lively, and ye don’t never come back again. Then after a week or so the parson reads the sarvice over yer name and prays fer ye, and the next mornin’, likely as not, yer legs drift ashore, quite independent-like, jest because the cod found yer tarred top-boots indergestible.”