And I have gone out often into the Arctic night, and viewed Nature under varied aspects. I have rejoiced with her in her strength, and communed with her in repose. I have seen the wild burst of her anger, have watched her sportive play, and have beheld her robed in silence. I have walked abroad in the darkness when the winds were roaring through the hills and crashing over the plain. I have strolled along the beach when the only sound that broke the stillness was the dull creaking of the ice-tables, as they rose and fell lazily with the tide. I have wandered far out upon the frozen sea, and listened to the voice of the icebergs bewailing their imprisonment; along the glacier, where forms and falls the avalanche; upon the hill-top, where the drifting snow, coursing over the rocks, sang its plaintive song; and again I have wandered away to some distant valley where all these sounds were hushed, and the air was still and solemn as the tomb.
And it is here that the Arctic night is most impressive, where its true spirit is revealed, where its wonders are unloosed to sport and play with the mind's vague imaginings. The heavens above and the earth beneath reveal only an endless and fathomless quiet. There is nowhere around me evidence of life or motion. I stand alone in the midst of the mighty hills. Their tall crests climb upward, and are lost in the gray vault of the skies. The dark cliffs, standing against their slopes of white, are the steps of a vast amphitheatre. The mind, finding no rest on their bald summits, wanders into space. The moon, weary with long vigil, sinks to her repose. The Pleiades no longer breathe their sweet influences. Cassiopea and Andromeda and Orion and all the infinite host of unnumbered constellations, fail to infuse one spark of joy into this dead atmosphere. They have lost all their tenderness, and are cold and pulseless. The eye leaves them and returns to earth, and the trembling ear awaits something that will break the oppressive stillness. But no foot-fall of living thing reaches it; no wild beast howls through the solitude. There is no cry of bird to enliven the scene; no tree, among whose branches the winds can sigh and moan. The pulsations of my own heart are alone heard in the great void; and as the blood courses through the sensitive organization of the ear, I am oppressed as with discordant sounds. Silence has ceased to be negative. It has become endowed with positive attributes. I seem to hear and see and feel it. It stands forth as a frightful spectre, filling the mind with the overpowering consciousness of universal death,—proclaiming the end of all things, and heralding the everlasting future. Its presence is unendurable. I spring from the rock upon which I have been seated, I plant my feet heavily in the snow to banish its awful presence,—and the sound rolls through the night and drives away the phantom.
I have seen no expression on the face of Nature so filled with terror as The Silence of the Arctic Night.
CHAPTER XVIII.
PROLONGED ABSENCE OF MR. SONNTAG.—PREPARING TO LOOK FOR HIM.—ARRIVAL OF ESQUIMAUX.—THEY REPORT SONNTAG DEAD.—ARRIVAL OF HANS.—CONDITION OF THE DOGS.—HANS'S STORY OF THE JOURNEY.
A full month had now elapsed since Sonntag and Hans left us, and several days of the January moonlight having passed over without bringing them back, I had some cause for alarm. It was evident that they had either met with an accident, or were detained among the Esquimaux in some unaccountable manner. I therefore began to devise means for determining what had become of them. First, I sent Mr. Dodge down to Cape Alexander to pursue the trail and ascertain whether they had gone around or over the cape. The sledge-track was followed for about five miles, when it came suddenly to an end, the ice having broken up and drifted away since December. Dodge could now only examine the passes of the glacier; and finding there no tracks, it was evident that the party had gone outside.
My next concern was to determine whether the tracks reappeared on the firm ice south of the cape; and accordingly I prepared to start with a small foot party, and cross over the glacier. In the event of finding tracks below Cape Alexander, my course would then be governed by circumstances; but if the track should not appear, it would be conclusive evidence that the party was lost, and I would proceed south until I reached the Esquimaux, for I could no longer afford to delay communication with them. Although the temperature had now fallen to 43° below zero, yet the careful preparations which I had made for camping relieved the journey from any risks on that account. The mercury froze for the first time during the winter while Dodge was absent, and I was extravagant enough to mould a bullet of it and send it from my rifle through a thick plank. Dodge, who was one of my most hardy men, returned from his twelve hours' tramp complaining that he had suffered rather from heat than cold, and he declared that, when called upon another time to wade so far through snow-drifts and hummocks, he would not carry so heavy a load of furs. In truth, both he and his two companions came in perspiring freely under their buffalo-skin coats.
ARRIVAL OF ESQUIMAUX.
My projected journey was, however, destined not to come off. The sledge was loaded with our light cargo, and we were ready to set out on the morning of the 27th, but a gale sprung up suddenly and detained us on board during that and the following day. Early in the morning of the 29th, the wind having fallen to calm, we were preparing to start. The men were putting on their furs, and I was in my cabin giving some last instructions to Mr. McCormick, when Carl, who had the watch on deck, came hastily to my door to report "Two Esquimaux alongside." They had come upon us out of the darkness very suddenly and unobserved.
SONNTAG'S DEATH REPORTED.