Every thing about me gave warning that I had returned from the north in the nick of time.
REFITTING THE SCHOONER.
McCormick had been at work as well on the inside as on the outside of the vessel. The temporary house had been removed from the upper deck, and the decks, and bulwarks, and cabins, and forecastle had been furbished up; and, after all this spring house-cleaning, the little schooner looked as neat and tidy as if she had never been besmeared with the soot and lamp-smoke of the long winter. The men were setting up the rigging; the bow-sprit, and jib-boom, and foretop-mast had been repaired; the yards had been sent aloft; the masts were being scraped down; and a little paint and tar fairly made our craft shine again. The sailors had moved from the hold to their natural quarters in the forecastle; and Dodge was busy getting off and stowing away the contents of the store-house, except such articles as I had proposed leaving behind, which were carefully deposited in a fissure of a rock, and covered over with heavy stones.
A CHIEF WAXED FAT.
The Esquimaux still hung round us. Tcheitchenguak had set up a tent on the terrace, and had for a companion a new-comer, named Alatak, and for house-keeper a woman, who appeared to have a roving commission, without special claim on anybody, and whom I had seen before at Booth Bay, where she figured among my companions as "The Sentimental Widow." Hans had gone, with his family, up to Chester Valley, where he was catching auks by hundreds, and living in the seal-skin tent that he brought from Cape York. Angeit still prowled round the galley and pantry, and continued, alternately, to annoy and amuse the cook and still stoutly to resist the steward's efforts at conversion. Kalutunah, my jolly old chief, held on at Etah, and looked to my abundant commissariat and fruitful bounty as the source of all human bliss. He had grown so rich that he did not know where to put all his wealth; and when I went over to Etah to look after him, I found him waxing fat on laziness, and stupid with over-feeding. I discovered him lounging behind a rock, basking in the warm sunshine, like the monk in the "Monastery," sitting before the fire, "thinking of nothing." He was much rejoiced at seeing me again, asked me many questions about my journey, and where I had been; said that he had never been so happy in all his life before; and he stole the thoughts, if not the Spanish, of honest Sancho, in his emphatic declaration, "You have filled my belly, and therefore have won my heart." I was sorry to have but one dog; to restore to him of the eight with which he had supplied me; but he declared himself satisfied. He appeared, at first, strongly to fear that, in returning his dog, I was withdrawing my support, and was much gratified when I told him to come over and get as much food as he could carry away.
TRACES OF ESQUIMAUX.
Kalutunah's first question was, whether I had found any Esquimaux. Before starting, I had frequently spoken to him concerning the extension of his people to the north, and he recited to me a well-established tradition of the tribe, that the Esquimaux once extended both to the north and the south; and that, finally, the tribe now inhabiting the coast from Cape York to Smith Sound were cut off by the accumulation of ice as well above as below them; and he believed that Esquimaux were living at this present time in both directions. That there was once no break in the communication between the natives of the region about Upernavik, along the shores of Melville Bay, there can be no doubt; and Kalutunah appeared to think that the same would hold good in the opposite direction. The ice has accumulated in Smith Sound as it has in Melville Bay; and what were evidently once prosperous hunting-grounds, up to the very face of Humboldt Glacier, are now barren wastes, where living thing rarely comes. At various places along the coast Dr. Kane found the remains of ancient huts; and lower down the coast, toward the mouth of the Sound, there are many of more recent date. Near Cairn Point there is a hut which had been abandoned but a year before Dr. Kane's visit, in 1853, and has not been occupied since. In Van Rensselaer Harbor there were several huts which had been inhabited by the last generation.
The simple discovery of traces of Esquimaux on the coast of Grinnell Land was not altogether satisfactory to Kalutunah, for he had confidently expected that I would find and bring back with me some living specimens of them; but he was still gratified to have his traditions confirmed, and he declared that I did not go far enough or I should have found plenty of natives; for, said he, in effect, "There are good hunting-grounds at the north, plenty of musk-ox (oomemak), and wherever there are good hunting-grounds, there the Esquimaux will be found."
THE ESQUIMAUX.
Kalutunah grew more sad than I had ever before seen him, when I spoke to him of the fortunes of his own people. "Alas!" said he, "we will soon be all gone." I told him that I would come back, and that white men would live for many years near Etah. "Come back soon," said he, "or there will be none here to welcome you!"